


The Return of the Ring

by avanti_90



Category: The Lord of the Rings - J. R. R. Tolkien, The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien, Vorkosigan Saga - Lois McMaster Bujold
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Crack, Alternate Universe - Fusion, Crack, Crack Treated Seriously, F/M, Telepathy
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-12-07
Updated: 2016-12-07
Packaged: 2018-09-03 16:35:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 11
Words: 46,979
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8721007
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/avanti_90/pseuds/avanti_90
Summary: Several months before the Barrayaran Emperor Gregor Vorbarra was to marry the Komarran heiress Laisa Toscane, Komarran freedom fighters collapsed the wormhole connecting the worlds of Komarr and Barrayar, leaving Barrayar isolated from the rest of the Nexus.Among those trapped on the lost world were Emperor Gregor and Lord Miles Vorkosigan. On the other side, Aral, Cordelia, and Mark Vorkosigan were left to hold the colony worlds of Sergyar and Komarr.Hundreds of years later, isolated Barrayar has long since moved on, and the other worlds of humanity have become the stuff of legends. But when mysterious visitors begin to arrive from the stars, the forgotten planet finds itself drawn into a desperate quest to save humanity from destruction.For the One Ring has returned. And it's on Barrayar.





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> Hi! I just want to say that this story is incomplete and likely remain so. I've been poking at it for a long time now, but at this point it's not likely that I'll finish it, at least not in the near future. Lots of people have told me they're interested in this story, so I would rather post something than nothing.
> 
> Though this story incorporates elements of Tolkien's Silmarillion, it should be fine for anyone familiar with both the Vorkosiverse and the Lord of the Rings.
> 
> I owe thanks to Philomytha and Minutia_R for beta-reading, to Joel Polowin, Pat and others on the Bujold mailing list for coming up with several plot elements, kerravonsen for inspiring others, and to three other people, who shall remain unnamed here, for brainstorming on battle strategies with me.
> 
> Words set in between angle brackets represent telepathic speech.

_Taniquetil, always and never:_

The mountain existed in all worlds, and in none; it existed in all times, and in none.

It rose tall and sheer by the shore of an endless sea, towering above all other heights. Its slopes bore fragrant trees of gold and silver that far above faded into an expanse of snow, and from there vast sheets of ice melted into a thundering river that ran down into the sea.

Upon its highest peak capped with everlasting snow there rose a mansion of dazzling gold. Its spires reached into the clouds, and eagles perched upon their heights. Birds and flying creatures of every description roosted in the nooks and crevices of its walls, and the sky overhead was filled with the thunder of their wings.

This was the domain of the Elder King, appointed ruler over gods and mortals alike. He was the master of the winds and of all the creatures of the air, and across the vastness of creation he watched through their eyes and listened through their ears. All from the smallest songbirds to the strong-winged reptiles of ancient skies did his bidding, and to them hidden paths and secret doors were opened; from all the worlds they came to the mountain to do homage to their King.

Upon the highest tower of Ilmarin there stood the Elder King himself, clothed in the blue of a clear summer morning. His hair and crown alike were white as the clouds that veiled the mountaintop, and his scepter was of gold studded with sapphires. Beside him stood his Queen, and she was clad in the colors of flame and radiant as the heart of a star; red-gold hair fell to her feet like a river of pure fire, and from the depths of her eyes there shone a spark of light that had lived before darkness ever entered into the circles of the world.

Icy wind swirled all around the mountaintop, but warmth enclosed the two figures as they stood gazing into the farthest dark. Standing together upon the towers of their timeless home, their eyes might see to the ends of the world and beyond; their ears might hear all that had passed, or was passing, or might come to pass, in all the worlds that were.

A piercing cry rang out above them, and they raised their eyes to see a magnificent golden eagle circling over the tower. As the Elder King lifted his hand the eagle folded its wings and plummeted toward him as if drawn by an invisible thread. It slowed its dive just above their heads, coming to rest on his outstretched arm and dipping a gold-feathered head in obeisance.

A pair of fierce golden eyes rose slowly to meet ancient sapphire-blue orbs, and thoughts were exchanged in unblinking silence, before the eagle stretched its wings and rose once more into the skies.

The two Valar remained still, watching the bird as it soared out over the sparkling ocean, until it shrank to a speck in the distance. A flash of light announced its departure as it returned to the place it called home.

The Elder King and Queen were of a mighty and ancient race; they had no need of sound or touch to convey their thoughts to one another. Only in the presence of lesser beings did they choose to converse through the medium of matter. They, after all, had created matter. In ages long past they had labored beside their kin, weaving the threads of reality into delicate fabrics of light and space and sound. Now they set such constructions aside in favor of perfect clarity.

The King began. < _It would appear that the One Ring has intruded upon the lower planes of reality once again. >_ 

Memories floated invisibly in hidden currents between them, of a lake of liquid fire in the depths of a mountain, burning heat and dancing flames; of a tiny golden spark, rising and then falling into the fire. Words of power blazed forth as it fell, shining brighter than molten rock. Then there was an explosion of light, and then, nothing.

< _Indeed we thought the Ring was destroyed forever when it passed into flame,_ > his Queen replied. < _But it has proved to be a far greater enemy than we ever imagined._ > If there had been a voice to hear, a lesser being hearing it might have mistaken its tone for sorrow, even though the Lady of Ilmarin was far beyond such things as sorrow.

< _We must have faith in our Father, > _her consort answered serenely. _ <All things serve His purpose, even the Ring_.>

< _And yet we must choose a champion once more_. >

< _It will not be easy,_ > he mused. < _The Ring grows more ingenious every time we meet it. In the last universe it manifested as seven different objects. That institution for juvenile three-dimensionals…_ >

< _That was a strange universe indeed,_ > the Queen answered, and again a lesser being might have imagined amusement in a voice that held none. 

Once more there was silence. A thousand worlds rose and fell; a thousand ages passed and went as their vision pierced the skies. The wind around the tower sped and whirled; one by one the birds fell silent and fluttered down to the golden walls, sheltering under their wings as it rose to a howling tumult.

And then it stopped.

A smile graced the Queen’s lips. < _But this time the Ring has chosen a home far stranger. Come, look upon it, Manwë._ > 

Varda, the Kindler, Queen of the Stars, uplifted her hands, and the air before her outstretched fingers shimmered with the light of a thousand stars.

 

***

 

_Imperial Barrayaran Battlecruiser_ _**Deliverance** _ _, year 400 of the Second Isolation:_

The viewscreen shimmered with the light of a thousand stars.

“I’ll be happy when my feet are back on land,” Captain Yegorov muttered sourly. “And I’ll be happier still when those old sticks at headquarters finally decommission this heap of junk. I hope I never set eyes on it again.”

He turned to his second in command and one-man crew, Lieutenant Alexei Csurik. “Check the monitors, Lieutenant. No point staring. There's nothing there except space. And more space. And - guess what? The same space.”

Alexei tore his eyes away from the stars, running a hand lovingly over the screen as he did so. Unlike his captain, he loved every square inch of his ship, from the tip of her polished hull to the deadly interior of her antimatter core. In the old days she would have been little more than a scoutship, but now she was called a Fleet Battlecruiser for reasons of obscure tradition, even though she carried no weapons. There was no longer anyone to do battle with, so what was the point? For that matter there was no longer an Imperial Fleet, unless one battered old not-really-a-battlecruiser could make up a fleet all by herself.

But there was still tradition. On Barrayar, there was always tradition.

And this, Alexei knew, was true tradition; the four hundredth annual Searching. He would give anything for the old days, when whole fleets of ships spent months mapping the vastness of Barrayaran space for an undiscovered wormhole. But the time of the Great Searchings was long over. Fleet after fleet had left home and returned with nothing to show, until people became too impatient or too busy to care. Isolated Barrayar had more urgent concerns, like food and terraforming.

So the old ships had been decommissioned one by one, and no new ones replaced them. Shipyards and spaceports had given way to farms, until at last all the great ships of Barrayar had been broken down for desperately needed scrap metal.

All save one.  _Deliverance_  was the last survivor of that once proud fleet; Alexei and Captain Yegorov the last bearers of that glorious tradition. It was a lonely life, some said a useless life, but Alexei had never regretted it. Tradition mattered.

He ran his eyes along the rows of gleaming monitors. All was as usual, except - he stopped and blinked for an instant.

He sprang to his feet. “Captain!”

The Captain spun around in his chair. “What is it?”

Alexei's fingers were already dancing across his console. “Five-spatial anomaly detected, sir!” he exclaimed. He could hardly believe it. They might have found it at last! A wormhole, a real wormhole! He, Alexei Csurik, the little prole from the Dendarii mountains, might go down in history as the savior of Barrayar!

“What?” Yegorov exclaimed. “If you think that's funny, Lieutenant-”

He came up to Alexei's shoulder and went very still. “Hell,” he whispered. “You're right.”

For the first time in four hundred years, a Barrayaran Imperial spaceship deviated from its intended course.

And for the four hundredth time in four hundred years, a Barrayaran Imperial spaceship found nothing.

“Give it up, Lieutenant.” Yegorov said gloomily, as Alexei checked his instruments once again. “There’s nothing to find here and we both know it. It’s time to go home.”

Alexei couldn't believe his readings. It had been right here. It had been so clear, so perfect - but the Captain was right. There was nothing now.

Or… was there? The readings were clear, unambiguous, but Alexei couldn’t shake the conviction that whatever he had detected was still nearby, so close that he could almost reach out and grasp it, if he only knew how. His hand stretched out beside him, and closed on empty air.

“I'd like to make a spacewalk, sir,” he said after a moment.

Yegorov's eyebrows flew up. “A spacewalk?” he asked. “What for? Do you think you'll stand out there and see the wormhole with your eyes? What d'you think a wormhole looks like, a big smiling face in the sky?”

“I just... I have a feeling, sir,” Alexei said. “There's something out there. I know it.”

“A feeling.” The Captain's words were coated with so much sarcasm that Alexei half-expected to be tossed out of the ship without a spacesuit.

“Yes sir,” he replied, looking out at the darkness. “A feeling.”

Yegorov scoffed and grumbled, but he wasn’t immune to curiosity, and half an hour later Alexei was standing on the outer hull with his spacesuit intact. He immediately looked up at the stars, but they looked the same as they always did. He suppressed his boyish disappointment - he hadn't really expected to see anything, all the old books said wormholes were invisible.

But Alexei turned on his torch, playing its light back and forth across the steel hull. His magnetic boots gripped the hull firmly as he made his way toward the engines. There was something there, on the port thruster. He couldn’t explain how he knew, but he was certain of it.

There - something glittered in the torchlight, clinging to the side of the thruster. Alexei reached it in three long strides and bent to pick it up.

To his astonishment, it was a ring. A small, slender band of gold with a large stone set in it. What could a woman’s ring be doing floating here in the middle of space? He turned it over, holding his torch close to the stone, and gasped.

The upraised bird of prey stared back at him through dazzling jeweled eyes, golden talons outstretched and gleaming. A fine web of gold lines ran across its unfurled wings.

The captain's voice crackled in his ear. “Csurik, report.”

Alexei fumbled with his comlink. “Sorry, Captain. It was nothing. A false alarm.”

The captain swore loudly, something about young idiots who had nothing better to do than waste precious time and money on their stupid hunches. Alexei shut off the comlink. Then he stood still in his place, slowly running his gloved hand all over the smooth, polished metal.

He really should have told the Captain, and it was still not too late to do so - but that thought disappeared almost as soon as it came. What did the Captain have to do with this, after all? It was so beautiful, so elegant…

So _precious_.

 

***

 

_Chaos Colony, 100 years later:_  

Lieutenant Lord Aral Vorkosigan awoke with a gasp in the middle of the night, covered in sweat. For a minute he stared blindly into the darkness, clutching the sheets tightly around himself, until the searing images in his head faded away into the walls of his bedroom.

The nightmare had been worse tonight; much worse.

Tonight it had been the song.

He had learned it early in his childhood, as did all the children in the Nexus. They sang it before they learned to talk. They danced to it before they learned to walk. They must know it; they must know what to fear. They must know when to flee.

His lips moved of their own accord, forming the familiar words. He had sung them with laughter when he was a child. Now they only filled him with fear.

_Seven rings for the haut-queens veiled from sight,_  
_Scores for the ghem-lords in their ships of steel,_  
_Millions for the Ba unmatched in might,_  
_One for the Emperor’s eagle seal,_  
_On lost Eta Ceta where the gene-banks lie._  
_One Ring to rule them all, One Ring to find them,_  
_One Ring to bring them all, to join their thoughts and bind them,_  
_On lost Eta Ceta where the gene-banks lie._

The door opened, and Aral looked up to see a tall man in brown and silver livery framed in his doorway. Lights flickered on as the old Armsman came into the room, looking down at his charge with familiar concern.

“Nightmares again, Lord Aral?” he asked.

“More than a nightmare,” Aral said, swinging his legs off the bed. “I've got to see the Viceroy. Now.”


	2. An Unexpected Funeral

When Lieutenant (retired) Alexei Csurik of the Barrayaran Imperial Service passed away at last, there was naturally much talk and surprise in the village of Silvy Vale. Alexei had been very wealthy and very peculiar, and the talk of the Vale for many years, mostly due to his astonishing habit of not being dead.

Of course that family had always been strong, but old Alexei was something else. He’d been as hale and hearty at a hundred and thirty-three as he had been at forty. Old age seemed to slide right off his strong back. It was unfair and unnatural, and after a half-century or so it was no wonder that the old women began to whisper about dark sorcery in the village.

But most of the villagers were willing to forgive old Alexei his exceptional fortune; indeed, most people seemed willing to forgive old Alexei just about anything. It was impossible not to like the man. It was impossible not to trust him, even when he was telling the most inflated lies you could imagine. Of course some men whispered that was how he’d made his money, but even that rumor did nothing to dent his popularity.

And the tales he could tell - Barrayar’s last spaceman! Of course Barrayar had had no need of spacemen for nearly a century, and likely never would again. But still, it was something to listen to his stories of flying away among the stars.

As the years had passed, the strange old spaceman of Silvy Vale had become something of a legend in the mountains, and he had acquired many devoted admirers among the boys of the village. Of these the closest to him was one Fyodor, a Csurik himself by descent from Alexei’s brother, who had died at a perfectly natural age. When Fyodor’s parents had died sixteen years ago, old Alexei had surprised the village by bringing the boy to live with him, and in time had made him his heir. It was Fyodor who lit the offering at the funeral, which all of Silvy Vale had attended, out of disbelief if nothing else.

The funeral was the sole topic of conversation at Speaker Karal’s house, where the old folk were gathered around the fire on a summer night a week later. Meat and maple mead flowed freely in Karal’s house, and that summer whispers flowed more freely still.

“Bet you anything the boy poisoned him,” Ma Ankov was telling the assembled company. “For the money, no doubt about it.”

“Ha!” Her husband waved a gleeful finger at her. “More than money behind that, I’ll wager. Don't forget all that flying off into space he did. What did Alexei bring home from the stars, I’d like to know? Alien treasures that a boy might well kill for-”

“You’re both wrong,” Ma Lannier interrupted, in a tone of absolute certainty. “It was sorcery, I tell you. Black magic.” She bent forward, dropping her voice to a sinister whisper. “Setting himself too high, Alexei was. Buying unnatural life with magic, telling tales of other planets like our Vale wasn’t good enough, keeping outlandish company like that gray vagabond - I told him a hundred times, what’s bought has to be  _paid_  for, but did he listen? And young Fyodor spent all those days studying alone with his uncle, and once he’d learned the secret he didn’t need the old man anymore, did he?”

The old Speaker stirred uneasily from his place by the fire. “Enough of this,” he said at last. “I’ll thank you all to remember the doctor called it a natural death, and I’ll not hear this kind of talk inside my house.”

Ma Lannier was not to be distracted from her favorite topic that easily. “And we know it was sorcery, for that evening my lad Lev was out up north, and he saw an enormous ball of fire floating over the mountaintop. And don’t you give me that look, Mara Ankov, he’s a good lad and knows to mind his drink. That was the night old Csurik died. I don’t need to know more.”

“I heard the same stories,” Ankov admitted grudgingly. “I was up in Tabris the day before yesterday, and people in the village were telling tales of strange lights on the mountain. Thought it was a load of nonsense, but now -”

“I saw the streak in the sky a week ago,” perked up Karal’s youngest boy, playing on the carpet. “It came from the north in the middle of the night, and lit up the whole sky in a trail of fire down to the river -”

“Hush, boy,” interrupted Karal gruffly. He turned back to his guests. “The boy talks nonsense. Nothing to it.” But his eyes were uneasy. “Anyhow, just because he died that night doesn’t mean young Fyodor -”

There was a cough from the open door. Everyone looked up and fell silent. Fyodor Csurik stood in the doorway, a stocky brown-haired young man whose face was strange without its usual smile, clad all in somber black. “Good evening, Speaker,” he said. “You wanted to see me?”

Karal went a little pale. “Oh, yes! Yes, come inside, boy, come inside,” he said, his false cheer not quite managing to cover up the silence. Rising from his seat, he removed a key from his pocket and went across the room to fiddle with the lock of a large cupboard. He opened it and rummaged around for a while, emerging at last with a satisfied “ah!”

“There,” he said, thrusting a small metal box into Fyodor’s hands with evident relief. “The day he died, your uncle came and gave me this box. He told me, Karal, you take this and keep it safe for Fyodor. Made me swear not to open it. So I’ve kept it safe, just as you see, for you.”

Fyodor looked down at the box dubiously. The Speaker lowered his voice to a whisper. “I don’t like it, boy. My house hasn't been the same since I let it in. Whatever's in there, I won’t have it back. So just you take it and go!”

Fyodor nodded. “Thank you, Speaker,” he said, and disappeared back into the darkness, taking the box with him. Karal wiped his forehead with a sigh of relief and disappeared even faster.

And people began to gossip in earnest.

 

***

 

Half an hour later, Fyodor was curled up in his armchair in Uncle Alexei’s cottage – no,  _his_  cottage now, gazing thoughtfully at the flames dancing in the fireplace. A sharp knock on the open door disturbed his reverie.

He looked up to see his cousin standing in the doorway. Samaria was close to him in age, and they shared the same curly brown hair and green eyes; but where Fyodor was short and fair, Samaria was tall and olive-skinned, her body muscled from years of heavy work. Her face was pretty, though too strong-featured to be called beautiful, and her long blue dress was old and patched in several places.

“Hi, Sam,” said Fyodor, shifting in his chair.

Sam came in, shutting the door behind her. “You look terrible,” she began.

“I feel terrible,” he muttered. “They all think I had something to do with it, even the Speaker. And I can’t do anything, because none of them will come out and  _say_  it in front of me.”

Sam tossed her head scornfully. “Then they’re all fools. Uncle had to die sooner or later – that’s what they all kept saying when he was alive! And now that he’s dead suddenly  _that’s_  unnatural too.”  

Fyodor shook his head. “They’re not fools, Sam, only ignorant. I have to live here, and how can I do that if they look at me like I’m going to curse them if they speak to me, and then they whisper when my back’s turned -”

“So don’t live here,” she replied easily. “How does it matter, now that you’ve got enough money to live anywhere you like?  _I’m_ leaving, aren't I?”

Fyodor looked up. “Your parents are letting you go?”

“Yes!” Sam gave a sudden laugh and spun around in delight. “Next month!”

“Oh, Sam!” Fyodor got up from his seat and went to embrace his cousin. “I'll miss you. But I'm happy for you.” Since coming of age Sam had been pestering her parents to let her ride down to Vorkosigan Surleau, where she meant to seek service in the Count’s household. In her mind it was a short step from the Count’s household in Vorkosigan Surleau to the Count’s household in Vorbarr Sultana, and Vorbarr Sultana was a land of dreams where anything might happen.

Fyodor didn’t understand her. He loved Silvy Vale. It was poor, and no place of great deeds, not like Vorbarr Sultana or even Hassadar. But it was where he had been born and lived and where he had always assumed he would one day die.

Sam caught sight of the box lying open on the table and pulled away from him. “What’s that?”

Fyodor glanced down. “Oh, that. It’s just Uncle’s old ring, the one with the bird. He left it for me.”

Sam bent over the table. “Oh, that ring. I always loved it.” She examined it silently for a while, captivated by the patterns of light and shadow flickering on its surface. “I never figured out why he wore it. It’s a woman’s ring.” She put out a hand. “Here, let me -”

There was a soft cough from behind her, and she spun around with a little cry. Fyodor turned around and smiled. “Oh, hullo, Gray,” he said. “How are you?”

The man standing in the shadows behind Samaria deserved his epithet. He had unkempt gray hair to match his well-worn gray clothes, and a general air of grayness; of fading halfway into the shadows, so that you never noticed him unless he wanted you to and you never remembered his face after he left.

No one knew who the gray man was, or where he came from, or what he did. He would just turn up in the village one day, listen to all the gossip, talk softly and in few words, and then he would disappear into the wilderness and not be seen for months or even a year. If you were wise you answered his questions, heeded his advice, and forgot about him as soon as you could.

But he’d been a friend of Uncle Alexei’s, and the two old men had often sat here by the fire while Fyodor curled on the sofa, talking about stars and spaceships and distant worlds. The gray man had been the only person Fyodor had ever met who could match Alexei’s encyclopedic knowledge of the subject.

Of course, this had only increased his strange reputation, and half of Silvy Vale now believed him to be the evil sorcerer who had taught Old Alexei the secret of longevity. But Fyodor knew better. The man who’d sat here telling him ancient stories on winter nights, who’d taught him history and taken him on walks through the mountains, was no tramp or wizard. He had been well-read, knowledgeable in the most obscure branches of study, and obviously expensively educated. Yet looking at him now, Fyodor thought he looked older and more careworn than ever before.

“Well enough. And you, young Fyodor, you’ve grown a mile since I last saw you.” He bowed courteously to Sam. “Miss Samaria. A pleasure, as always.”

She glowered at him, but without much anger. “The door was closed.”

“Doors that are closed are meant to be opened,” he answered calmly. “Now, would you please leave us alone for a few moments? Your cousin and I have matters of great importance to discuss.”

“Well!” She shot them a glare, but left the cottage; even Sam, who was a Csurik through and through, could be wary of Gray. The man settled himself comfortably in an armchair across from Fyodor, gazing at him for a long time with weariness in his eyes.

“I’m sorry,” he said at last. “Your uncle was a good man, a very good man. I’d hoped to see him today, but it seems I have to deliver my message to you in his stead.”

“What message, Gray?” asked Fyodor, surprised.

To his even greater astonishment, the gray man stood up, went to the windows, looked this way and that and then closed all the shutters before returning to his armchair. He bent forward and lowered his voice to a whisper. “That ring, Fyodor!”

“This?” said Fyodor, picking up the ring from the table and running his fingers over the screaming bird. “What about it?”

“Fyodor, I believe that ring is dangerous, maybe more dangerous than you can imagine. Think about it. Your uncle took off the ring – or was made to take it off - for the first time in living memory, and that very night he died. Do you believe that’s just a coincidence?”

Fyodor went still. Had it been anyone else, he would have dismissed the words, but the gray man had a way of knowing things that no one else did. “Are you saying,” he whispered, “that it really was murder?”

“No," his visitor answered seriously. "Or at least not the way we know it. I’m saying it might have been something far stranger.” He paused. “Tell me, Fyodor, do you know how your uncle came by that ring?”

Fyodor cast his mind back over years of half-forgotten conversations. “He never told me much about it,” he admitted. “All he said was that he found it on his last spaceflight.”

“Yes,” the gray man answered. “Alexei Csurik’s last spaceflight. Barrayar’s last spaceflight. Your uncle came back from that mission with no job, no family, and no money, in fact nothing at all but a small golden ring, and yet his wealth increased, his friends multiplied, his health improved dramatically. And the strangest thing is that whenever I pointed this out to him, Alexei never thought to connect the two.”

Fyodor was listening carefully. “Are you saying that this ring is the source of Uncle Alexei’s long life?” He glanced from it to his finger.

“No!” the gray man exclaimed, leaping to his feet. “You must not put it on!”

Fyodor stopped, reluctantly. He did so want to try it on just once. The slender circle of gold would fit his finger so perfectly…

Then he realized that his finger was a good size thinner than Uncle Alexei’s.

He looked up, suddenly frightened. “What is this?”

“You must be careful of that ring, Fyodor,” the gray man said, pacing across the room. “I’m glad to see that Alexei kept the truth to himself. But I managed to get the full story out of him one night years ago, and I think you need to know.

“On that last flight a century ago, Alexei’s ship stumbled across a distortion in space, and they changed their course to investigate it - that being their mission, after all. They found nothing, but Alexei had a feeling that something was calling out to him, and he went outside. There he found the ring –  _this_  ring - attached to the hull of his ship. He couldn’t imagine how it got there. In fact, he couldn’t think of anything, except that it was very beautiful, and so he kept it for himself. He lied to his captain and pretended he had found nothing.”

He turned abruptly. “Now you tell me, Fyodor, does that sound like something your uncle would do?”

“No,” said Fyodor instantly. “Not at all. He was always an honest man.”

“Exactly,” his friend nodded. “So then we must ask ourselves, what sort of object could have such an effect on an honest man?”

“Are you saying it really is sorcery?” Fyodor yelped. “Oh, I wish he had never left it to me! Gray, we must destroy this thing at once!”

“Could you?” asked his friend, suddenly quiet. “Could you, really?”

Fyodor looked down at the ring and bit his lip. It was so beautiful, he thought, so perfect in its shape and color and purity. It would be a terrible pity to destroy something so precious. The bird was strangely lifelike, its jeweled eyes glittering brightly in the firelight, glaring at him so reproachfully...

“Do you feel it, Fyodor?” whispered the gray man. “It’s a thing of power. In any case your plan wouldn’t work. This ring is of pre-isolation manufacture, and cannot be destroyed by any means we now possess. And there is more,” he continued. “Strange things are stirring in the north. I’ve heard rumors of a strange creature in the hills, one that, just like this ring, is mysterious and golden and cannot be destroyed. And I think it’s moving in this direction.”

He looked straight into Fyodor’s eyes. “I believe that these happenings are connected to the ring, and to your uncle’s death. And therefore I believe that Silvy Vale is no longer safe for this thing - or for you, Fyodor Csurik.”

“Not… not safe?” asked Fyodor, bewildered. “Not safe from what? And what am I to do about it?”

The answer came instantly, blunt and dispassionate. “There’s only one thing you can do. Leave Silvy Vale at once.”

“Leave!” exclaimed Fyodor. “Gray, I can’t do that!” He’d hardly ever been more than three or four villages away from Silvy Vale; he’d never left the mountains in his life. Silvy Vale, the cottage and the fields and his friends and all of it, was all the home he knew.

But - for how much longer? Everyone thought... well, everyone thought all manner of things, but people he’d once counted as friends were now whispering about him being a murderer. Better to leave – better to leave, than be chased out.

Fyodor let out a long, slow breath. “All right,” he said quietly. “I’ll do it.”

“Leave tonight, and don’t mention it to a soul,” his companion instructed. “You must take the ring to Vorkosigan Surleau. The Count is there now. If there’s any place on Barrayar where you may be safe, it’s there.”

Fyodor felt suddenly very small and alone at the thought. “You’ll come with me, won’t you?”

The man shook his head. “No. I must leave at once. There’s work for me in the north.”

“So I am to go alone?” Fyodor stammered. “To… to the Count’s home? To the Count Regent himself? They’ll never let me near him!”

The gray man rose and went to the door. “Tell them I sent you," he said, turning around to look at Fyodor with penetrating eyes. "That will be enough. And,” he cautioned gravely, “whatever you do, Fyodor,  _don’t_  put on that ring!”

 

***

 

In the fading darkness just before dawn, Fyodor gathered some of the money his uncle had left him and packed it into a bag with clothes, food and water. He strung the ring carefully onto a long chain, touching it as little as possible. Then he slipped the chain over his head and tucked it under his shirt.

He slipped out of Silvy Vale while the village was still sound asleep. Standing alone at the end of the path with his pack slung over one shoulder, he looked back at the closed door of the old cottage, home to so many happy memories, and felt a sudden pang of grief.

“Good-bye, home!” he called, feeling exceedingly foolish, but secure in the knowledge that no one could hear him. “Good-bye!”

“Fyodor, for heaven’s sake,” said a voice. “Stop being a baby and come on.”

Fyodor looked up in dismay. A figure was waiting at the bend. Two stout ponies stood saddled and ready beside her, their reins held firmly in her hands. His cheeks flushed. “Sam. How did you know?”

“Windows that are closed are meant to be opened. Now get on.” She shot him a smile and jerked her thumb at the pony on her right. “Is that your food? That’s not enough even for you, you dolt. Lucky I packed for both of us.”

Fyodor stood still at the door. “Oh, Sam. You’re not coming, are you?”

“You bet I am,” she replied. “You’d starve to death in the woods without me to look after you. Oh, and you did remember to take the ring, didn’t you? It’d be just like you to go all the way to the Count and then find you’d left it in the cupboard.”

Fyodor went over to her. “No, Sam, you heard him. This thing is dangerous. I can’t take anyone with me. If something happened to you -”

Sam crossed her arms and stood her ground. “Fyodor. I’m not staying behind while you get to meet the Count himself! Besides, do you really think you’ll be safe without me?” She patted her belt, and Fyodor made out the sheath of a long knife there. She held out another to him. “Did you even think of packing weapons?”

Fyodor started to argue, then stopped. He would probably be far safer with Sam than without her. And Sam herself was to ride to Vorkosigan Surleau soon; if strange creatures inhabited the paths, no one should go alone.

To be honest – well, he couldn’t deny it, he’d be happier with Sam along.

“All right.” he said, smiling at last. Taking the knife from Sam’s hand, he mounted his pony. Soon they were heading down the mountain road at a steady trot, side by side.


	3. A Disintegrator in the Dark

The red sun drifted beneath the mountains at their backs, and the shadows of the trees fell long and thin across the narrow winding road as Fyodor and Sam made their way down across the hills to Vorkosigan Surleau. They had ridden hard for two full days, stopping often to hack through thorny bushes and brambles that had grown over the little-used paths, and now both of them were sweaty and exhausted and badly scratched.

At last they came upon a large tree by the roadside, its broad overhanging branches shady and inviting. “Yes, I think it’s time to rest,” declared Sam, and she promptly dismounted and flopped down under the tree. Fyodor untied their packs and followed her example, sitting down in the cool shadow to rub his legs. Eventually they managed to rouse themselves long enough to unpack their spread of bread and cheese. They ate in companionable silence, listening to the chirping and buzzing all around them.

After they had finished, Fyodor lay back beneath the branches and stared out into the distance. He could see no lights on this side of the mountain, but below them a cluster of bright spots marked the town of Vorkosigan Surleau beside the dark lake. Already he was further from Silvy Vale than he had ever been in his life.

His uncle had taken him camping once, many years ago. They’d gone on until Fyodor couldn’t believe that there was anything left, that they hadn’t seen everything there was to see and it wasn’t just wilderness left until the end of the world.

Alexei had chuckled to hear that. “You’re a Dendarii lad through and through. But there’s more to the world than these mountains, remember?”

“Yes, uncle.” Fyodor had nodded obediently. “Hassadar to the north, Seligrad to the south, and Vorbarr Sultana where the Emperor lives. And the ocean, and the Southern Continent. And all the other things.”

“ _Those_ other things,” Alexei had said, pointing up. It had been a clear night, and Fyodor still remembered how the stars had been out in thousands, making sparkling, whirling patterns that had taken his breath away.

“Never forget to look up as well as down.” Alexei had said. “We came from them, and they’re part of our world too. One day we’ll remember that, and they’ll remember us.” Alexei’s eyes had been filled with longing, the ring on his right hand shining with light reflected from who knew where, the bird’s eyes gleaming ferocious and glorious.

Tonight the sky was cloudy and the stars hidden from sight, and Fyodor looked out across the shadowed hills instead. And as he looked it seemed to him that far in the distance there was a light in the northern sky; it shone bright and golden in the dark, a remote sparkle on the summit of a distant hill. It couldn’t possibly be the sun, for the night was not yet old. “Sam,” he called. “What’s that?”

“Your imagination, belike,” muttered Sam, who was already half-asleep, curled up under her blanket with her eyes tightly shut. “Go to sleep, Fyodor.”

Fyodor tried to obey, but for many hours he lay awake, gazing out over the dark mountains in search of a golden light. Then at last weariness overpowered him; his eyelids drooped, and he fell asleep without noticing.

 

***

 

He woke up abruptly in pitch-darkness. He knew something was wrong even before he opened his eyes, but it took him a few moments to place it. He could hear Sam’s heavy breathing on his right hand, but that was all. There was no other sound in the woods, no buzzing of insects, no twittering of nocturnal birds, not even the rustling of the leaves in the chill wind.

It was as if the entire mountainside was sitting still and listening with sharpened ears, waiting for something to happen. Without thinking, Fyodor found himself stilling his own breath and tensing in anticipation.

Then he heard it; a low, clear musical sound, carried by the wind from below them. Soft and melodious, unlike any bird or instrument he had ever heard. Fyodor could feel it calling to him, warming his shivering limbs despite the cold night.

His hand went of its own accord to the chain beneath his shirt. The ring was glowing softly in the darkness, pulsing, throbbing, the jeweled bird looking as if it would at any moment stretch its wings and take to the skies. Fyodor sat bolt upright and leaned over, shaking Sam by the shoulders. “Sam, wake up! Wake up!”

“What -” She opened her eyes reluctantly and looked around. “Fyodor, you numbskull,” she began in familiar exasperation. “It’s still dark -” Then she heard the music and stopped.

Fyodor held a finger to his lips and stood up, shaking off twigs and grass. Sam scrambled to her feet and followed him. Swiftly and silently they went off the path and down the slope, following the music deeper into the forest.

At first Fyodor took out the ring and held it aloft to serve as their light. But as they walked, a gentle golden glow illuminated the forest around them, until they no longer needed any other light. The unearthly song became louder with every step they took, until it seemed to saturate every bone and vein of their bodies.

At last they reached what seemed to be the source. Dazzling light shone from behind a thick bush, filtering through the long leaves to make ghostly dancing patterns on the soft earth. Fyodor and Sam crouched together behind the bush, holding their breath.

Slowly, Fyodor reached out and parted the leaves.

His eyes widened. His heart stopped.

He was in love.

A woman stood in the center of the grassy glade, clothed in robes of the purest white and glittering like a star fallen from the heavens. Her hair, lustrous and dark as midnight, trailed on the ground about her pale, slender feet.

Her skin was pearl-white, shining in the darkness as brightly as the golden ring around her finger. Pale night-flowers fluttered down from their umbels to adorn her silvery mantle and her hair. Even the birds perched high above were wide awake, their beady eyes fixed on her.

Fyodor watched, wonderstruck, as her exquisite lips parted in song. He felt as though all his exhaustion and worry and fear had been washed away in a wave of cool water, even as all of Ma Lannier’s tales of fairies in the woods came back to him in a rush.

He was on his knees, entranced, enchanted, his quest forgotten. He could die now, having seen this wonder. But to speak to her, just once, to touch her hand – to stand on the grass where her feet had rested -

Without knowing quite what he was doing, he stood up and rushed out from behind the bush. “Nightingale!” he cried, his voice harsh and grating above the music. “Nightingale!”

The song stopped. The fairy stopped. Slowly, she turned around and saw Fyodor. Her beautiful face contorted into an angry snarl as she reached to her waist and drew a weapon.

All of a sudden the spell broke; all the joy and wonder fled from Fyodor’s mind, and a feeling of terrible helplessness came over him. He was frozen in place; he could not move a muscle. He stood utterly still as a blast of white-hot fire shot from the muzzle of the strange weapon.

But Sam cried out and ran from behind the bush, pushing Fyodor out of the way. The beam missed his head but hit his shoulder, and Fyodor collapsed to the ground with terrible pain burning down through his arm. “Sam, run!” he shouted. “Run, get help!”

He heard her take off at once, crashing through the bushes. Fyodor curled up and clutched his burning shoulder, closing his eyes against the pain as he heard the strange weapon fire again and again into the bushes where Sam had fled, heard the crack of breaking branches and smelled burning wood.

He opened his eyes to see the fairy approaching him, her weapon now pointed directly at his head. Terror overcame Fyodor like an onrushing wave, and he threw himself flat on the ground before her.

The ring throbbed against his chest with sudden urgency. Suddenly he felt an overpowering need to put it on, just once. The desire filled his mind and drove away all other thoughts, even that of terror. He forgot the gray man’s warning, forgot his own fear of sorcery, for a moment he even forgot the lovely and terrible form approaching him. He simply felt that he must take out the ring and put it on his finger. He was going to die in any case; what was the point of resisting?

With that thought he drew off his glove and slipped the ring onto the first finger of his trembling hand.

The fairy-woman stopped, her large blue eyes widening in shock. For a moment she and Fyodor only stared at each other, both frozen still.

Fyodor didn’t know what was happening to him. His vision seemed to have sharpened a thousand times. He looked at the woman before him, and in the unearthly light he found that he could see beyond the mask of her beauty. Inside he saw her as she was, cold and proud and merciless; he felt as if he were touching smooth stone covered with winter ice, and a shiver ran all the way down to his toes. 

Now fear surrounded her like a cloak, and Fyodor knew her fear, yet he was no longer afraid. Bizarrely, he felt as if he could touch her without moving a finger; though his thoughtless desire had long passed he reached out. Shields fell and closed doors flew open, and her mind was laid out before him. All her thoughts, from ancient memories to sudden fears, were so close that they might have been his, and yet were clearly separated from him.

In the silent clearing Fyodor saw a night sky bursting with light, hundreds of thousands of glorious stars strung into jeweled necklaces in the dark. Beneath them there was a great dome of silver light; under the dome, bright gardens and crystal pools surrounding white towers; a thousand birds of a thousand colors whirling like dancers in the air. Music filled his mind, music unlike anything he had heard before, that seemed to come from no human voice or instrument but drawn straight from the stars and into his soul.

And over them all there soared the likeness of a vast eagle, its talons sharp and gleaming, its golden wings outstretched for flight.

The woman’s arm dropped limply to her side, the weapon falling from her unresisting hand, and she threw back her exquisite head and screamed. Her shriek was as terrible as her song had been fair; cold and high-pitched, lingering in the air. Fyodor covered his ears, but it went on ringing, over and over in his mind. He drew back as quickly as he could, his head whirling from the bewildering sensory assault.

But her unearthly voice still sounded in his head, broken and defeated. < _My lord, command me_. >

Then Fyodor felt another presence there in the glade – no, not in the glade, but beside his mind. An entity he could not see, regarding him, probing, questioning. Somehow Fyodor knew it was a man, but not a man like any he had ever seen; if the woman was stone and ice then this was fire, a forest fire of blazing hatred that wiped out mountains in a day and turned cities into fields of ash and oceans into clouds of steam.

< _Who are you?_ > it demanded. Fyodor remained silent in fear, clutching the threads of his thoughts tightly. The demand grew furious, the voice a rising thunder against his mind. < _Who are you!_ >

And then suddenly the world blacked out and an explosion of rage filled Fyodor’s mind. He felt as though his head was about to burst with pain. He couldn’t see anything beyond a mist of rage and agony.  _This is the end_ , he thought through pain and bewilderment, leaving no room for regret.

Through the haze Fyodor heard the sudden noise of breaking branches behind him, and a man's voice, though he could not make out the words that were spoken, and Sam’s panicked voice, calling his name.

At the noise the pain receded for a moment, and with a last effort Fyodor tore the ring off his finger. He lay exhausted on the ground, sweating and trembling. The pain in his head released him; the voices faded. The fairy woman, or whatever she was, stood before him still, but she was looking not at Fyodor, but behind him.

Fyodor raised himself halfway from the ground and looked up at a young man, his face pale and shocked beneath dark hair, hazel eyes glittering in the faint light. He was holding a stunner – a real stunner! - aimed and ready, though his hand trembled a little. Sam was standing behind him, her eyes wide.

The fairy woman seemed to come to herself with a little shake. Her surprised expression vanished, to be replaced by cold hauteur. Raising a hand, she snapped her fingers.

Instantly a ripple in the air beside her formed itself into a delicately woven chair of gold. She seated herself gracefully on it, and a bubble of golden light snapped up around her and the chair. The stunner’s beam deflected harmlessly off the shimmering surface.

“Beth, fire! Fire!” the man cried. Another stunner bolt flashed through the trees, striking harmlessly against the bubble along with his own. Fyodor could now hear voices and pounding feet coming closer from all directions.

Suddenly, the bubble took off into the air, sailing over the treetops faster than any bird until it was out of sight. Sam ran over to Fyodor's side at once, kneeling down beside him.

“Who was that?” she asked, looking up at the now empty sky in amazement. "Who -  _what_  was that?"

Their mysterious rescuer followed her. “Do you know,” he said in an equally puzzled tone, “I have absolutely no idea.”

Men now emerged from the trees to surround the little group on all sides, with torches and weapons in their hands. The torchlight lit their forest-green uniforms, and even in his dazed condition Fyodor could see that they wore the Horus-eyes of ImpSec on their collars.

“Sire!” said one of them, “You can’t just run off like that -”

Sire? Fyodor looked up in surprise at the young man standing behind Sam. He took in the dark hair, the pale face, the hazel eyes, and mentally called up an image of the stern-faced boy in parade uniform whose portrait hung on the Speaker’s wall in Silvy Vale. He was looking at none other than Emperor Vlad Vorbarra himself.

“Sire,” he managed to say in a hoarse voice, just before he passed out.

 

***

 

Fyodor awoke in an enormous bed more soft and comfortable than anything he had ever felt. At first, looking up at the carved ceiling from beneath silken sheets, he thought he must be in some splendid dream. But then he stretched out and felt a stabbing pain in his shoulder. He looked down to see it swathed in bandages.

With a gasp he thrust a hand under his collar, drawing out the chain. The ring was still there in its place, no longer glowing or calling out to his mind. Lying here in a warm bed with sunlight coming through the window, Fyodor could almost believe it was nothing more than what it appeared to be: an especially fine piece of jewelry.

“Put it away,” said a soft voice.

Fyodor turned around. A delighted cry escaped his lips. “Gray! But…” he blinked in surprise. “You aren’t gray anymore. You’re green.” He was wearing… Imperial Service dress greens?

“Yes,” said the old man, who was sitting in a chair beside the open window. “I arrived yesterday, just in time to hear the tale of your absurd adventure. You’ve been incredibly stupid, Fyodor.”

Fyodor looked down. “I’m sorry,” he said, at last remembering his friend’s warnings and how little he had heeded them. Then, remembering more: “Where’s Sam? Is she all right?”

“Quite all right, and taking in the beauty of Vorkosigan Surleau,” his friend replied. “You've worried her; it took quite some effort to pry her away from your side. I think Lady Elizabeth has taken her for a walk by the lake.”

Relieved, Fyodor stretched out more comfortably in the bed. “How long have I been asleep?”

“A week, more or less.”

Fyodor stared, shocked. “A week! But it was only my shoulder!”

The old man shook his head. “No, not your shoulder, though whatever did that was no ordinary weapon. Your mind. I underestimated the ring - in the short time you had it on, it nearly drained your strength.” His brow furrowed in deep thought as he bent forward to examine the ring hanging from its chain around Fyodor’s neck, but his hands did not approach it.

“I knew the thing would turn up sooner or later, but I hadn’t truly realized its powers. But there is no need to be afraid. I know what this is, and where it has come from, and its purpose.”

“You do?” Fyodor tried to sit up at once, sending another stab of pain into his shoulder. “Tell me!”

The old man shook his head. “Not at this time, Fyodor. Not until you’re ready to hear it.”

“Oh, come on, Gray -” pleaded Fyodor.

“What is this, Galeni?” an amused voice broke in. “Is that what they call you in the Dendarii mountains?”

Galeni. Stunned once again, Fyodor slowly took in the green uniform, the tabs, the golden Horus-eyes on his old friend’s collar.  _Galeni_. “Oh,” he whispered, comprehension finally dawning on him. The renowned and feared Chief of Imperial Security, General Duv Galeni, whose name had reached all the way to Silvy Vale, if not his face - his friend.

And then he took in the young man clad in black and silver, dark-haired and hazel-eyed, who stood leaning against his open door. “Sire,” he blurted out, “thank you. You saved my life, you -”

“I did little,” said Vlad Vorbarra, waving away Fyodor’s gratitude. “It's my personal physician you should thank. He spent a long time being utterly fascinated by that shoulder of yours.”

“The… that  _thing_?” asked Fyodor, as memories of the night in the woods returned to him. “What happened to her – to it? It’s not coming here?”

“Peace,” The Emperor assured him. “You are in Vorkosigan Surleau, and you are here as a guest of the Count. No one will hurt you in this house.”

As Fyodor absorbed this, a plump face peered at him from behind the Emperor’s shoulder. It was a boy, dark-haired and richly dressed, carrying a plate in one hand. “Hey, Vlad,” he said, “you called me?”

“Ah, yes,” said the Emperor. He took the boy by the shoulders and pushed him in front of Fyodor. “Fyodor Csurik, this is my cousin, Padma Vorpatril. He’ll look after you while you’re here. Try not to kill him, however tempting you might find it. Beth is rather fond of him.” With those encouraging words the Emperor left the room.

Fyodor and Padma blinked at each other. Then Padma’s face broke out into a smile. “So you’re the Dendarii boy!” he began. “Vlad says you were attacked by a fairy in the middle of the woods!”

“Yes, my lord,” Fyodor replied cautiously, wondering how high this boy was in the ranks of the Vor, to speak so casually of the Emperor.

“Oh, don’t waste your breath on all that. What did she look like? Was she pretty? Tell me all about it! Sorry,” the boy added, apparently remembering his assignment as host, “Would you like a cake?”

Feeling just a little bit overwhelmed, Fyodor accepted a piece of cake. Galeni’s lips twitched a little. “You should sleep while you can,” he said. “The Count will expect you at his council tomorrow morning. Much is happening, Fyodor.”


	4. The Council of Count Vorkosigan

Upon a hill behind the summer home of the Vorkosigans there was built a simple and elegant wooden pavilion, open to the wind on all four sides. A stone table had been placed in its center, with several comfortable chairs set in a wide circle around it.

Count Vorkosigan, who had been Regent of Barrayar for the past four years, sat next to the soon-to-be-enthroned Emperor. General Galeni sat on the Count’s other side, as calm as ever; only others seemed uneasy in his presence. And on the Emperor’s left there sat a lady, the only one present apart from Fyodor and Sam who wore no sort of uniform. Fyodor judged her to be perhaps twenty years of age, with the same fiery red hair and dark, deep-set eyes as the Count. This, he realized, must be the Count’s daughter and heiress, the famous Elizabeth Vorkosigan.

On Galeni’s other side sat a tall man with golden hair. Fyodor could not help staring at him, rude though it was. His uniform was strange, bearing only a distant resemblance to Imperial greens; it was several shades darker, with ribbons and decorations unlike any others, and the material was strange too, far more fine and elegant than Lady Elizabeth's dress. Instead of collar tabs the man wore a colored band around his right forearm, a lieutenant’s red. He glanced back and forth with a confused expression that made Fyodor feel sympathy, but unlike Fyodor he seemed unimpressed by what he saw.

Apart from these the Prime Minister and several of his council were present, and many high officers in the green uniform of the Service. Fyodor hunched up in his chair, feeling very small and out of place in this illustrious gathering, while Sam sat straight-backed and proud at his side, meeting all their stares.

“My lords, ladies and gentlemen,” Count Vorkosigan began, “We have summoned you all here to seek your advice on the strange events of the last few weeks. Events that will determine the fate of Barrayar – no, not of Barrayar alone, but of the entire Nexus.”

The people gathered in the pavilion stared at him in surprise. “Sire,” said the Count, raising a hand. “Will you begin?”

They all listened as the Emperor told the story of the previous week, describing how he and the Lady Elizabeth had been riding in the woods behind Vorkosigan Surleau; how they heard a cry for help, and found first Sam, and then Fyodor lying on the forest floor with the fairy-woman aiming a weapon at him. He went on to describe the woman in the woods, and the golden bubble, and how it had deflected the energy of their stunners. By the time the bubble soared off into the sky, the audience was glancing uncomfortably at each other, evidently hoping someone else would speak first.

“He was not hallucinating,” said Lady Elizabeth sharply. “I saw it. And I felt it. Whatever was in that - that bubble - was telepathic, strongly so, and it was trying to probe my mind. It was all I could do to just hold it off for a few seconds. And there was something else there as well -” She broke off uneasily, her dark eyes fixed on Fyodor, and he knew that she, at least, had seen the ring for what it truly was.

“I think the existence of this being must be accepted beyond doubt,” said Galeni. “My agents and I have been collecting eyewitness accounts from all over the Dendarii mountains. While some of them involve of balls of fire and other imaginative nonsense, and many involve large quantities of maple mead, the one thing they all have in common is a golden sphere that floats above the hills, and cannot be damaged by any means.”

The disbelieving expressions around the table faded a little. It seemed that no one doubted, or dared openly to doubt, the Chief of ImpSec. “What is this creature?” asked the Emperor in wonderment. “A woman’s shape, yet she is no woman. She can float through the air, she can call up a shield of light - if the hill-boy and Beth hadn’t seen it as well, I would have said I’m going mad. What is this?”

The Count and Galeni exchanged a glance. “There are references to such things in pre-isolation books,” said the Count. “They are described as force-bubbles.”

“Force-bubbles?” the Prime Minister echoed.

“Indeed. According to the texts in my library, the haut-women of Cetaganda traveled in force-bubbles to avoid being seen by lesser beings. And the Emperor’s description would seem consistent with that, though there is only one recorded account of what a haut-lady looks like.”

The Prime Minister looked confused. “My lord, you speak of ancient history. Our books tell us that we have been isolated from Cetaganda for five centuries.”

The Count leaned back in his chair and steepled his fingers under his chin. “Not… quite. Gentlemen, ladies, allow me to present to you my distant cousin - Lord Aral Vorkosigan  _of Sergyar_.”

There were sudden gasps from the assembled men and women as every pair of eyes turned on the man seated beside Galeni. Even Fyodor jerked upright in his chair. “Sam,” he whispered. “Did I hear that right? Did he say –”

Sam clutched Fyodor’s hand tightly, her eyes lit with sudden excitement. “Sergyar,” she repeated in a whisper. “Yes. Shh.”

“Oh,” Fyodor breathed. “If only Uncle could have seen this…” Then he fell silent, for the Count was speaking.

“This is no jest,” said the Count softly. “There is proof, if anyone wants it. There is his jumpship, crashed on the field behind that mountain there. There are the contents of the ship, which prove clearly that he is not from our level of technology. And there are the coordinates of the wormhole through which he came.”

There was a long, long silence in the pavilion. Fyodor could see tears in several eyes. “A wormhole,” the Prime Minister whispered hoarsely. “Can it be true? A wormhole at last?”

The Chief of the General Staff was more cautious. “A wormhole to where?” she asked.

The man - Lord Aral – raised his chin and answered her in a clear baritone. “Beta Colony, madam.”

Her lips parted in sudden joy. Some of the men around the table looked as though they were about to weep. “My God,” someone whispered. “It’s over at last. The Second Isolation is over.”

“Be careful,” said the Count. “Before this day is over, you may find yourself wishing that things had stayed as they were.”

There was a hush in the pavilion. “The Nexus has changed a great deal, it seems, since our ancestors were cut off from it. Let our guest explain.”

Lord Aral Vorkosigan rose slowly from his seat. “My lords, my ladies,” he began. “It’s an honor to be here. I never imagined this would happen. We haven’t heard anything in all the years since Komarran terrorists caused the old wormhole to collapse -”

“Komarran terrorists?” someone interrupted angrily.

“Hell. Everybody assumed it was a natural disaster -”

“When we get back out there, those bastards are going to  _pay_  -”

“Silence!” The Count gestured to Lord Aral. “Go on.”

“It was a plot,” he explained. “After the wormhole closed, there was rebellion on Komarr, but it was put down and the planets united by my ancestor, Count Aral Vorkosigan, the first Viceroy of Komarr and Sergyar. He and his wife, and their descendants after them, ruled over the two planets, and still do so.” He paused. “I’ve come here as the Voice of my father, the eighth Viceroy of Sergyar. He sent me -”

“Wait,” Emperor Vlad interrupted. “The Viceroy of Sergyar? What of Komarr?”

“Ah.” Lord Aral looked down at the grass, hands tightening behind his back. “Komarr… well, my lords, Komarr is dead. There’s nothing left of it but an uninhabited wasteland. The Cetagandans atomized every square inch of its crust in the War.”

Everyone looked stunned by the news as it sank in, but Fyodor's eyes fell on Galeni. The old man looked as if he had been physically struck. Blood had drained from his already pale face, and his fingers were clenched tightly around the arms of his chair as if he would collapse without their support.

“Go on,” the Emperor managed at last.

Lord Aral did so. “You all know that the Cetagandan Empire was ruled by the haut, a race of genetic engineers who were devoted to making themselves the perfect humans. Back when the wormhole closed, they were already famous for their beauty, strength and intelligence. But that wasn’t enough for them. A little over three centuries ago, they incorporated something else.” He lowered his voice. “Telepathy.”

Beside the Emperor, Lady Elizabeth smiled for a moment.

“In time the Cetagandans discovered how to make artificial minds, cutting and pasting patterns of thought like gene sequences. They learned to grow bodies without minds, empty shells, transferring their immortal consciousness from body to body. They advanced to a level of technology that was unimaginable anywhere else in the galaxy. But even that wasn’t enough for them.”

Sam let out a soft whistle. Fyodor felt a sudden shiver; a woman of inhuman beauty standing before him with her mind laid open before his eyes, her innermost thoughts written like words across a book for him to read.  _Perfection._

“The haut Tenar Giaja, Celestial Lord of Cetaganda, caused a telepathic controller to be forged into the Great Seal of the Star Creche. He wore that seal as a ring upon his finger, and by means of mental command he forced each of his subjects to wear a ring that was controlled by his own. Through his master ring he could see and hear and control the minds of all his subjects, wherever they were in the galaxy. His armies poured across the Nexus, destroying everything in their way. They wiped out the populations of entire star systems. They  _tore entire star systems_  out of space. The haut were perfect, and they saw the rest of the human race as nothing more than vermin, filthy and repulsive, deserving only extermination.”

A horrified silence fell over the pavilion. “And then,” asked the Emperor softly, “how did the human race survive?”

“It’s a strange story,” Lord Aral admitted. “And historians aren’t really sure how it happened. Somehow it turned out there was a whole planet of telepaths - Athos – lying low, just waiting for this to happen. At the peak of the War, when Beta Colony was about to fall, the Athosians revealed themselves and beat back the Cetagandans. But only for a time. Then the haut attacked Athos in full strength. Tenar Giaja himself led his forces into battle at Athos, and they wiped out every last telepathic man on the planet.”

 _Did they let the women go?_  Fyodor wondered. Perhaps there were limits to the Cetagandans’ evil, even to the pride and hatred he had felt that night in the woods.

“But,” said Lord Aral, “the Athosians did what they were supposed to. They distracted Giaja long enough for a team of soldiers to get aboard his ship and into his presence. Even as the last soldiers of Athos were being wiped out, a human soldier cut the ring from Giaja’s finger and took it, breaking his control over his forces. Once the Cetagandans were individuals instead of a hive-mind, they could be defeated, and the fighting turned in favor of the human alliance.”

“And Giaja?” asked the Chief of the General Staff. “Was he killed?”

Vorkosigan’s expression grew wary. “No. He fled home with seven of the haut, and together they pulled off the greatest feat of engineering in galactic history. They took the entire Eta Ceta system and moved it - star, planets, satellites and all - through five-space. No one knows how. No one knows where it is. As for his telepathic ring, the Great Seal, the alliance tried everything to destroy it – acids, antimatter, nuclear explosives. Nothing worked. Finally they did the only thing they could. They threw it down a wormhole on a random trajectory into five-space, and hoped it would stay lost for good.”

The Prime Minister cleared his throat. “This is all very interesting,” he said. “But what has it to do with us?”

Lord Aral turned to answer him, and for the first time Fyodor noticed the lines etched deep into the man’s face, the dark circles under his eyes. Now they were getting to the heart of the matter.

“For the last three hundred years,” he said, “the human race has been rebuilding from the ruins of the War, preparing for the time when we'd have to fight again. Our grandparents and great-grandparents tried to prepare us. They told us the stories, trained us, taught us that we had to be ready when the time came. But when years passed without a threat, we began to believe that the Cetagandans were gone forever. We weren’t so lucky.”

In the long silence that followed, Lord Aral said six soft words. “The Ba have been seen again.”

It was clearly not the reaction that he had hoped for. People glanced back and forth at each other, confused. It was Lady Elizabeth who finally spoke. “Ba… ah, would those be the genetically engineered neuter caste who serve the haut? Prepare meals, tend gardens, that sort of thing?”

Lord Aral looked at her in plain astonishment. Fyodor heard him mutter something under his breath.

She drew herself up in anger. “Perhaps you should remember where you are, my lord.”

He paused. “I see. Of course. Yes, I suppose the Ba were servants - once. Not anymore.  _These_  Ba are a race of genetically engineered super-soldiers - sterile, strong, merciless, fanatically devoted to the haut. They're the deadliest killing machines you can find anywhere in the Nexus.”

”And they have returned,” she repeated, paling.

“Yes,” he answered. “In the last ten years, the Ba have been ranging freely through our space and assaulting our vessels. We believe some of their troops were even commanded by  _Ghem._  They’ve reoccupied the old Cetagandan satrapies, and Kline Station and Marilac have already fallen to them. The last news I had before I made the jump here was that there’s fighting around Escobar, and Sergyar itself is preparing for assault."

He looked up, and everyone could see tears forming in his eyes. “For the last year, I’ve been having these dreams – visions of Sergyar falling. Hordes of Ba rampaging through Chaos Colony, destroying everything in their path. The Viceroy’s Palace crumbling in flames. And… other things, stranger and more terrible. Eventually I begged my father to give me a jump-ship, to let me go. Since then I’ve been on my own, searching the galaxy for unexplored wormholes.”

“Have you come to ask the aid of Barrayar in this war?” asked Emperor Vlad. “If so, you will have it.”

Vorkosigan shook his head. “What aid could Barrayar give us against such an enemy? If the Cetagandans return at even half the strength they used to have, nothing on this world could hold them off for an hour. No, all I hoped was to find any kind of habitable planet where our people might hide when everything else failed. I found the wormhole, and so, well, here I am.

“But I was followed by a haut-lady – the one we just heard about, I suppose. I had to crash in the mountains, and then she chased me through the forests for a week until I reached the Count’s home.” He lowered his head, and Fyodor heard a soft sigh escape his lips. “And it was all useless. I came to find a refuge, and instead I brought the enemy with me. The haut-lady is here, which means that the Celestial Lord knows. News travels instantaneously from mind to mind. Barrayar is doomed, my lords. I’m sorry.”

There was a long silence in the pavilion.

At last the Prime Minister spoke up. “Can we please be isolated again?”

“Yes!” chimed a man opposite Fyodor. “You know how the Komarrans did it, surely? We can learn to block this new wormhole of yours, hell, build some ships and send out the searchers again, tell them to block  _every_  wormhole -”

The Count’s eyes were cold slits. “Is that what you would have me do?” he asked. “Vor lords and ladies at a council of war, and this is the advice you give me - to lock our doors and hide? Would you have the rest of the galaxy say that Barrayar has become a world of cowards?”

Men and women shifted in their seats. “My lord Count,” answered the Chief of General Staff, “If what we hear is true, there will not be a rest of the galaxy. We can do nothing about this. We have no ships, no weapons to compare -”

“No?” said the Count, and Fyodor noticed his daughter smile that mischievous smile again. “You are wrong, General. We may well have in our possession the greatest weapon of all.”

He turned, and suddenly his gaze was fixed upon Fyodor. Fyodor felt his back straightening automatically in response. “My lords, my ladies, I will give you the answer that all of you seek. I call forth Fyodor of Silvy Vale.”

Now all eyes, including the Emperor’s, turned to Fyodor. He swallowed. “Stand up straight and tell the truth, Fyodor,” said General Galeni. “Don’t worry.”

Fyodor obeyed. Bowing awkwardly to the assembled council, he told the tale, beginning with his uncle’s discovery of the ring in space a hundred years ago. His voice grew steadier as spoke of his uncle’s death, General Galeni’s visit, his and Sam’s flight from Silvy Vale, until at last he finished with their dramatic rescue in the hills.

“Sire,” he said at last, lowering himself to one knee before his Emperor, “I am only your humble servant, but I owe you my life. Anything that I can ever do to serve you, I will do.”

The Emperor smiled down at him. “Well spoken,” he answered, gesturing to Fyodor to rise, “but at the moment I wish only one thing. I wish to see this famous ring of yours.”

“Indeed,” said the Count, “So do I. Bring forth the ring, Fyodor!”

Fyodor stepped forward and removed the chain from his neck, but as he began to let go he was seized by a sudden reluctance to reveal the ring. His fingers clasped tightly at the chain, his eyes drawn to the golden spark dangling from it.

Shuddering, he looked away, and dropped the chain along with the golden ring upon the table. Around him people leaned forward in their seats, craning their necks for a better view.

Now that the ring had left his care, Fyodor felt immensely relieved to be rid of it. It was as if a much greater weight than the tiny piece of gold had been lifted from his shoulders. There, his task was done. It was out of his hands. Let these great folk do whatever they wanted with it.

Lord Aral gave an amazed cry, and instantly he was on his knees before the table with the ring in his hands, turning it over and over, running his hands over the upraised eagle. “The Great Seal!” he exclaimed. “It's the Enemy’s ring, the Great Seal of the Star Crèche - the source of Giaja’s power! My lord Count, you’re right – this is it, this is the weapon to destroy all weapons. I must take this back to Sergyar at once, to my father – used rightly, this could give us power over all the forces of Cetaganda!”

The Count's eyes were saddened as he looked down at the kneeling man. “No,” he said.

Lord Aral looked up in surprise. “No?”

The Count shook his head. “I thought you would want it,” he said. “And the answer is no. I will not permit you to take it.”

Lord Aral looked first bewildered, then furious. “You - how  _dare_ you?” he said, standing up. “Do you have any idea what's happening out there in the galaxy? The Cetagandans are  _back_. There could be millions of people dying as we speak, and you have here the one thing that can help, how can you not permit -”

“The Count is quite right,” said the Chief of the General Staff. “My lords, this ring has appeared on Barrayar. By our laws it is the property of the Emperor. It is his right to wield it, not that of the Viceroy of a distant planet -”

Lord Aral spun on her. “Do you realize," he said acidly, "that you have no idea  _at all_  what you’re talking about?”

“But I do.” Every pair of eyes turned as Lady Elizabeth Vorkosigan rose from her seat.

“I may be no more than a barbarian to you, my lord,” she said, facing the Sergyaran. “But my father has taken this decision at my request, and in this you will listen to me too. You  _all_ will. This ring is dangerous. You may begin by using it for the best of reasons, but by the end you will be the one used. Your ancestors knew that at the end of the War, my lord. They chose well. The ring must be destroyed.”

Vorkosigan had flushed at her words, but he stood his ground. “And what would you know about the Great Seal?” he demanded. “You've never even heard of it before today!”

“No” she answered, meeting his eyes. “I have not. But I have heard its voice in my mind. My hand touched it in the woods when I carried its bearer home on my horse, and there it spoke to me.”

He blinked. “You've -” The significance of her earlier words seemed to strike him at last. “You - you're - a telepath?”

“Elizabeth is Barrayar’s most powerful telepath,” said Count Vorkosigan. “She got it from her mother.”

“That’s impossible,” Lord Aral stammered, his expression shaken. “The Cetagandans hunted down and destroyed every remnant of Terrence Cee’s tissue cultures ages before the war -"

“Except the one that was hidden from them,” said Lady Elizabeth. “One culture was acquired by Barrayaran Imperial Security before the wormhole closed. Though it was long ago, our family has preserved the story - and the bloodline.”

Vorkosigan could only gape at her in amazement.

“Well, my lord,” she gave him a sudden fierce smile. “It seems we barbarians have something of use to you after all.”

“But then you know,” Lord Aral said. “You know how powerful this thing is. How can you not understand that we need it? It may well be our only hope of survival now.”

“This ring,” she said, pointing to the chain on the table as if she were afraid to bring her hand any closer, “is not yours to use, Lord Aral. It was made for evil and by evil. This ring was made to mold billions of minds to its will. How long do you truly believe you, or your father, or anyone else, could control it? Listen to me. The ring  _must be destroyed_.”

Lord Aral took a deep breath. “But it  _can’t_ be destroyed,” he explained patiently, as if to a child. “This is Star Crèche work. There is no technology in the known galaxy that can melt or break or even dent this thing. Even tossing it down a wormhole failed. It’s as impossible to destroy the Great Seal as it is to destroy Giaja himself.”

Galeni’s eyes were half-closed. “For my part, I would not touch this thing. Imagine the power its wearer would command - imagine all the legions of Cetaganda, all their ships and weapons, only a thought away. Tell me, what man among your number would you entrust with that power?”

Every man and woman exchanged uneasy glances with their neighbors. “The Viceroy my father,” insisted Lord Aral. “You do not know him, but he has kept Sergyar at peace all his life, and he will continue to do so, legions or no legions.”

“Why, the Emperor, of course!” said the Chief of the General Staff.

"Indeed,” Galeni’s voice dropped to a menacing whisper. “Do I understand correctly, General? You would have His Majesty allow a dangerous telepathic artifact of enemy manufacture access to his mind?”

The General’s mouth opened and closed.

“No,” said Galeni with finality. “Whether the ring is evil or not, such power will break the strongest of us. And the stronger the wearer, the greater his fall will be. I would not touch it. But one of us must.”

He looked up from the sparkling ring to Lord Aral. “When you say impossible, tell me… is it really that impossible? Is there no way that you can think of? No stories? No legends, perhaps, that might have been passed down from generation to generation?”

Lord Aral looked at him in confusion. “Well,” he admitted reluctantly, “Now that you mention it, there is a children’s story… a sort of prophecy, I suppose. But how did you know?”

“I am told,” murmured Galeni, “that there is always a prophecy.”

Even the guards in the background glanced at each other. No one seemed to know quite what to do with this pronouncement, but clearly no one dared to contradict the Chief of ImpSec.

“There is a rod,” said Lord Aral. “The Great Key of the Star Crèche, which is held always by Giaja himself. It contains the gene sequences and the consciousness-patterns of all the haut and ghem that ever lived or can live. The Great Seal fits into the Key and unlocks it, allowing its master complete power over every Cetagandan. The legend says that when the Chosen One takes the Great Seal –”

“- to the Star Crèche on Eta Ceta -” added General Galeni,

“- and fits it on to the Great Key -” continued Lord Aral,

“- Tenar Giaja will be destroyed forever,” they chorused.

Lord Aral stared at Galeni in amazement. “How did you know that?” he demanded.

Galeni did not answer at first, gazing thoughtfully into the distance. Even his expression did not change. “At last,” he whispered. “It’s time.”

Count Vorkosigan looked thoughtful. “It does make partial sense,” he allowed. “If this ring must be destroyed, and the rest of the galaxy has no means to do it, the only place to look is Cetaganda. What they made, they will have the means to unmake.”

“It makes more sense than that," Galeni said. “Think of it. Such power - where did it come from? The Cetagandans learned to create telepathy with living minds, not metal. We can infer that Giaja used his own powers to create and sustain the ring. Is it not then likely that he continues to do so, that he and the ring are more closely linked still? Perhaps those who fought the war knew that. Destroy the ring and he is ended – and with him, Cetaganda.”

“This is absurd!” Lord Vorhalas broke in. “Tell me, how do we even know these are not lies and nonsense? Telepathic rings? Far more likely this is a children’s tale blown out of all proportion.”

The Count shook his head. “I might have thought the same, were it not for other evidence.” He raised a thick leather-bound red book from his side. “These are the memoirs of my ancestor, the eleventh Count. In his youth he visited the Celestial Garden on Eta Ceta, and I shall quote to you a passage from his description of his travels there.”

He opened the book and began to read aloud.  _“The indented seal on the end-cap was in the shape of some clawed and dangerous-looking bird. Deep within the incised figure gleamed metallic lines, the circuit-connections. Somewhere somebody owned the mate, a raised screaming bird-pattern full of complex encodes which would release the cover, revealing . . . what?”_

“This, I presume, refers to the Great Key. And there is even a description of the ring itself.” He flipped over a few pages and continued.

“ _She laid the Great Key in her lap, and pulled a long necklace from beneath her layered white garments. The chain held a ring, decorated with a thick raised bird-pattern, the gold lines of electronic contacts gleaming like filigree upon its surface. She inserted the ring into the seal atop the rod. Nothing happened.”_

Fyodor stared down at the bird. Fine gold lines threaded its wings. He had thought them to be merely decorative. Electronic contacts?

Lord Vorhalas's expression grew set. “I see. If this thing is real, then it is indeed dangerous. I agree with you, my lord. If it can be destroyed, it must be.”

“Well, then,” said Galeni almost cheerfully, “we have our decision. The ring must be taken to Eta Ceta and destroyed. The only question that remains is: who will take it?”

“But that’s ridiculous!” Lord Aral exploded. “You people have no idea what you’re talking about! We don’t even know where Eta Ceta is! And even if we did, it’s surrounded by fleets and fleets beyond your imagination. Whole legions of Ghem and Ba. And the Seven, the Consorts, the haut-ladies. You’ve heard what one can do, and she’s not even the most powerful. Together they’re all but invincible, and even then they’re no match for the Celestial Lord himself. And you want to take the Great Seal there? Into their grasp? Are you all mad?”

Galeni smiled coolly. “Not mad,” he said. “We merely have… additional information.”

“Mad,” Lord Aral insisted. “And who'd be suicidal enough to attempt it, anyway?”

There was a long expectant silence, during which all the lords and generals seemed to have become deeply preoccupied with their boots. From across the circle Galeni raised his eyes to look straight at Fyodor. Fyodor wondered what he wanted. Galeni made a little motion toward the table with his fingers, and Fyodor blinked.

Galeni sighed deeply and closed his eyes, an expression of profound concentration on his face. From somewhere, certainly not from his own closed lips, Fyodor heard his own voice declare, “I will take it!”

Sam turned to him in astonishment. “Fyodor, you fool! What’re you saying?”

“I’m not saying anything!” Fyodor yelped, but Galeni had already spoken over his voice, “Well done, Fyodor! I knew you had courage!” The General Staff was staring at Fyodor in what looked like profound relief.

Count Vorkosigan was not. He turned to Galeni doubtfully. “The boy?”

“Yes,” Galeni replied. “He must go.”

“Why? Sam cried, rising from her seat. “Why him?

Even the Count was looking surprised. “I do not understand, Duv,” he said softly. “He is young, and inexperienced, and powerless. Why should he go?”

“Because he is young and inexperienced and powerless, and therefore he has the best chance of us all to succeed.” Everyone stared at Galeni, perplexed.

“Look,” said Galeni finally, “let me put it this way. Of all the places where the ring might have fallen, why did it come to Barrayar, the only world in the Nexus where it would be safe from its enemies until its master recovered the strength to claim it? Why did it fall into the hands of Alexei Csurik all those years ago? Why did he remove it on the day he died?” He turned to Fyodor. “The choice has already been made. You, Fyodor, are meant to be the Ringbearer. The Chosen One.”

 _That’s rubbish_ , Fyodor thought.  _You’ve made the choice for me, old man. You’re playing us all._  He looked down at the ring on the table. Might it be listening to every word they said? Were they fools to be discussing their plans in its presence? Was it making plans of its own as they spoke?

And then he looked up at the solemn face of his Emperor, and remembered his own words spoken in the sight of all the council:  _Anything that I can ever do to serve you, I will do._  And so he made no objection.

Sam cleared her throat. “You’re not going alone,” she said. “I’ve seen you in action. You’ll fall to pieces at the first sight of one of those haut-women. I’ll have to come, just so I can haul you back from your love-struck trance before you get yourself killed.” She shook her head, muttering, “Nightingale!”

“I will go with you, at least for part of the way,” the Emperor said. “We may have been away for several centuries, but our Empire still has a claim upon us. If Sergyar is in danger, my place is there.”

Lord Aral looked up sharply. “Sergyar has no Emperor now,” he said, quietly but firmly.

The Emperor met his eyes. “Sergyar has had no Emperor,” he allowed. “Until now.”

The Sergyaran’s eyes narrowed at these words, but he said nothing. He was silent for a few moments, looking from one Barrayaran face to another.

At last he seemed to reach a decision. He turned to Fyodor. “Well, I think it’s a stupid idea, but it that is what this Council wants, very well. We'll risk it. I’ll take you through the wormhole and as far as Escobar. After that you must find your own way, unless you decide to come with us to Chaos Colony.”

“Sire,” interjected Galeni, “If you go, I must come as well. My job is to protect you.”

“And I’m coming too,” put in Lady Elizabeth.

“What?” said the Regent and the Emperor in unison.

She looked up proudly at Lord Aral. “Am I to understand that there are no telepaths left in the rest of the galaxy, except for Cetagandan ones?”

“That’s right,” he confirmed. “They all died in the Battle of Athos. Well, there is one left, but she’s…”

“Then you need me,” she said matter-of-factly. “You need a telepath to fight telepaths, my lord. I will come with you.”

His jaw worked silently for a moment. “All right,” he said at last. “Agreed. But my ship will only take seven, including myself. No more.”

“Seven to set against the seven haut-ladies,” said Count Vorkosigan. “So be it. That leaves us with one more place in this fellowship. Who wants to go?”

There was a long silence during which many people grew deeply interested in the state of their shoes once again. “Come on, gentlemen,” coaxed the Count Regent. “Are there to be no takers for the greatest adventure of our time? I’ll take the first person who volunteers, I promise.”

“Me!” Padma Vorpatril leaped up from behind a rose bush, hand raised high in the air. “Take me!”

“Padma,” sighed the Count, “you idiot.”


	5. The Ring Goes to Space

The next morning, after all the fuss was over, Sam and Fyodor held a council of their own in Fyodor’s room.

“ _Of Sergyar!_ ” Sam began, her eyes shining with amazement as she paced around before the open window. “Well, nobody expected that! And a wormhole, Fyodor – just think of it, a real wormhole, right here, and _we’ll_ be the first ones out of it!”

“I’d much rather stay at home!” Fyodor answered. “You’re not thinking, Sam. This isn’t a prize or a holiday – it’s a hopeless errand, and I don’t know how little people like us could be of any use on such a journey.” He looked down at his bandaged shoulder. “I thought this adventure was _over_ , and I could go rest – go back to Silvy Vale, or live in the village by the lake, or something.”

“Well, you can’t now, not after the Count himself chose you! _I’m_ going. We Csuriks ought to stick together, and we will. And there should be someone with brains in this Fellowship.”

“That’s right!” agreed Padma Vorpatril, poking his curly head through the window behind Sam. “But I don’t think our Fellowship’s going anywhere for a while.”

The plump Vor lord clambered through the window, and perched on the corner of Fyodor’s bed. “There’s all sorts of stuff going on,” he whispered eagerly. “Count Vorkosigan sent for engineers from the capital last night; a whole truckload of them turned up a minute ago, and no sooner did they get here than they all had to be horsed and saddled for a ride into the mountains. Lord Aral, the Sergyaran, he’s going off with them. I don’t think we’ll see much of him for a while.”

“And what about Galeni?” Fyodor asked, interested despite himself. “He must be up to something, I’m sure.”

“Oh, he’s going off too,” Padma waved a hand airily; apparently he didn’t take the dreaded Chief of ImpSec as seriously as everyone else seemed to. “Galeni’s being even more inscrutable than usual; he’s got spies out in all directions, searching all over the District for any sign of that haut-lady. More will go tomorrow. He says he doesn’t want to leave until we know what she’s up to.” He stretched out, making himself comfortable. “So cheer up, Fyodor! We’ll all have a long stay here.”

“Ah!” Sam said gloomily, even though yesterday she would have been happy to spend the rest of her life in Vorkosigan Surleau.

For a long time the three young people continued to talk and think and argue about the journey ahead of them. But as the day passed, and then the week, Fyodor’s wounded shoulder healed and grew strong again, and his memories of the adventure in the mountains faded a little.

None of them forgot, but they thought of other things, and passed their time pleasantly in Vorkosigan Surleau, exploring the library, admiring the magnificent ballrooms, or swimming in the long lake. The servants treated Fyodor and Sam as honored guests, giving them fur-lined clothes and fine food. Sam was delighted with all of it. She had hoped no higher than being a servant in this house; this surpassed her wildest dreams.

Fyodor’s thoughts, on the other hand, circled back again and again to Silvy Vale. He had planted roses and blue cloudflowers by the door of the cottage, a strange mixture of Earth-descended and Barrayaran flora; would they grow without him? Would the Speaker find someone else to keep his records in order? Would they take his flight as final proof that he had murdered his uncle?

“They’ll be picking apples up north of the village,” he told Sam, when she found him sitting by the long lake one morning. “We could have helped. Old Ankov said it was the best season he’d seen in fifty years.” But Sam, who could now have any fruit she cared to eat just by asking, didn’t seem particularly bothered.

Two weeks passed, and the season began to change; a cold wind had started to blow when Vorkosigan Surleau began to fill with people again. The Count and his daughter returned from the capital, followed days later by the Emperor Vlad.

Galeni came soon after, for his spies began to return from all directions. But the news that they bore was not good. In no region of the District had they discovered any signs or tidings of the golden haut-bubble. There was no shortage of strange lights floating in the darkness, but it was impossible to discern imagination from true sightings.

Last of all returned Aral Vorkosigan. He rode down from the mountains with a still-bewildered band of engineers who looked as if their wildest dreams had come true - but Vorkosigan himself only looked exhausted and worried.

“It’ll either make it all the way to the wormhole, or it’ll blow up the moment we launch and give you a spectacular crater,” he reported to the Count. “I don’t know which. But I’ve done everything I can.”

And so the Fellowship was gathered.

The morning after Vorkosigan’s arrival, Fyodor was sitting in the library reading the histories of Barrayar. He had reached the tale of the closing of the wormhole, and the war that had followed and the eleventh Count Vorkosigan who had ended it, when he heard low voices from behind a long row of bookshelves.

“If the ring is to go,” said Galeni’s stern voice. “It must go now. To wait any longer is to leave ourselves vulnerable. Who knows what the Cetagandans might have done on the other side?”

“So we send out - with our only weapon - two children from the Dendarii mountains.” Count Vorkosigan retorted. “And the Emperor, and my silly nephew, and _my_ _daughter_. Of all the strange plans you have ever put before me, General, this has to be the strangest.”

“Patience, my lord,” answered Galeni. “You have known me ever since you were born. In all that time, have I ever given you wrong advice?”

The Count laughed a little at that. “Yes,” he said. “I have known you since I was born, as did my father before me. And my grandfather before him, and _his_ grandfather too, I suspect. Someday, Duv Galeni, someone will notice that there is something strange about one man being Chief of ImpSec for – how long has it been? Even I cannot remember.”

“Four hundred and eighty years,” answered Galeni. “And no, they will not notice. Not unless I wish them to.”

On the other side of the bookshelf, Fyodor froze in his chair, knowing with certainty that those last words were directed at him.

“Very well,” said the Count at last. “I will go along with your plans one more time, General. And I hope for all our sakes that you know what you are doing.”

***

So the next day the seven members of the Fellowship rode up into the mountains, accompanied by the Count and his armsmen. They rode for a day, slowly and carefully, wrapped warmly against the cold and leading many horses loaded with supplies for a long journey. At last they crested a tall hill, and all the Barrayarans gasped in awe at their first sight of the gleaming silver craft in the valley below.

Fyodor's eyes traveled from the ship to the sky overhead. Soon they would be on their way. To the stars, to the wormhole; to other worlds. All his life he had thought of the great worlds of the Nexus as a setting for his uncle's and Galeni's ancient stories, too comfortably distant to seem real. Now all of a sudden they were real, and uncomfortably close.

Only Count Vorkosigan walked down with them to the open door of the spaceship. He bade farewell to his daughter before she entered the ship, and then turned to the Emperor. “Take this, and my blessing,” he said, handing Emperor Vlad a heavy object wrapped in paper. “Keep it with you always on your journey, and you will not fail.”

The Emperor removed the paper and stared at the contents. “The memoirs?” he asked. “You’re giving me the memoirs of Miles Vorkosigan?”

“It has always been a guide to me in dark places,” answered the Count. “And it will be so to you as well, I am certain.”

The Emperor stared. “Sir, I thank you, but… I don't think it'll be a lot of use. We've had recent material to study from the ship's records. The information here is five hundred years out of date.”

“The wisdom is not,” answered the Count. “And you will all have need of wisdom on this journey; wisdom, and courage, and wits. None of you lack them, but you will need more than any of you alone possess. Guard each other, and trust each other through whatever dangers come, and you will succeed; fail to do so, and you will all fall.”

He turned to Fyodor and spoke in a low voice, for Fyodor’s ears alone. “This mission is given only to you, Ringbearer: to carry the ring to Eta Ceta and find a way to destroy it. The others of your fellowship will help you, but they are not sworn to go to the end, and they may not carry your burden. It is a terrible risk you take, for I do not know how far your destination lies, nor by what means you may reach it. Will you take up this charge, Fyodor Csurik?

Fyodor nodded solemnly. “I will, my lord.”

“Then good luck, for you will need it. Good luck to all of you. Our hopes go with you.”

Fyodor entered the spaceship last, the white doors sliding closed behind him. Through the windows he saw the Count and his armsmen watching as the ship began, with a slow rumbling noise, to move.

Despite Lord Aral’s fears, the ship actually rose above the valley and into the sky with perfect grace. The Barrayarans watched awestruck through the screen as Barrayar shrunk from a reddish-brown globe to a fist-sized ball, to a pinprick amid the wheeling stars.

With the planet far behind, the Fellowship gathered around Lord Aral in the control room. Vorkosigan pulled up a series of navigational charts on his screens and began to explain his plan.

“We’ve done well so far,” he said. “We’ve reached the borders of the Barrayaran system quickly enough, and now we’re close to the first jump-point we have to cross.” He highlighted a spot on his chart, which faded into another region of space. “And then we must cross a second, which is a lot more complicated to navigate. But it’s right on the borders of Betan territory, and only a few hours’ journey from the planet itself.”

He traced his finger along the space between the two wormholes. “We have four days’ travel between them, if we take the fastest route. The only problem with the fastest route is that it leads us right through this.”

His finger halted at a diffuse dark spot, which moved to the center of the screen. “What is this?” asked Fyodor as it grew and grew.

“It’s called the Mayhew Nebula,” answered Lord Aral. “A cloud of dust and debris and asteroids left over from the Great War. Few ships enter it, if any, and fewer still come out. It’s not a safe journey, or an easy one.”

Galeni’s eyes on him were watchful. “I take it there is a reason you want to take us through this, instead of around it?”

“I’d like us to make it to Beta as fast as we can,” he answered firmly. “The alternative is to spend almost two weeks making our way around it, and I don’t believe this ship can last that long. I had to make a lot of repairs with primitive equipment, and I’m not even a qualified engineer.” He hesitated. “Also, before I reached Barrayar, this was near the borders of Ceta- occupied territory. Their raiding parties went freely wherever they wished, and I don't know what may have happened since then. I do know that the more time we stay, the greater the risk we take.”

“And you believe you can guide us safely through?” asked the Emperor.

“I already have,” Vorkosigan answered a little stiffly. “That’s how I discovered the way to Barrayar. I tried to shake off the haut by leading her on a random course through the nebula. It was one of the stupidest things I’ve ever done. Though I suppose it worked, in a strange way…”

He glanced at Fyodor, shook his head, and went on. “With many of the automated systems down, I can’t do this on my own. I’m going to teach all of you to handle the ship. If I’m injured or incapacitated at any point, you’ll need to be able to complete the journey without me. We’ll work shifts.” He met the Emperor’s eyes briefly. “I don’t lead this fellowship. But while we’re on my ship, I will need all of you to follow my orders in an emergency.”

They all nodded gravely, and he began to give orders to prepare for the first jump.

 

***

 

Fyodor grew increasingly nervous as the jump approached. Uncle Alexei had explained the theory behind wormhole transits, but that had been at a comfortable, academic distance. Now he could only remember ancient tales from before the Second Isolation, of ships that went into wormholes and were never heard from again, swallowed whole by the ghosts of folded dimensions.

Galeni, sitting beside him, leaned across to whisper. “It won't hurt,” he said. “There used to be people who made wormhole jumps every week and didn't suffer any ill effects. And that was before the Second Isolation. This necklin drive is quite a bit more advanced than the ones they had.”

Galeni spoke as one who knew from experience.  _Four hundred and eighty years_ , Fyodor had heard him say, and it hadn't sounded like a joke. But Galeni looked utterly human, not like a demon or a wizard or anything out of Ma Lannier's stories to scare naughty boys.

“Mind you,” continued Galeni, “the basic technology isn't all that different. I would have expected a lot more to change in five hundred years. From what I can tell, after the war with the Cetagandans a lot of sciences were so devastated that they had to start over from scratch.”

Fyodor said nothing. Galeni was completely calm as the jump approached. Beside him, the Emperor sat straight-backed in his seat, showing little outward sign of fear; only his eyes, darting from side to side, gave him away.

“Wormhole transit in ten seconds,” said Lord Aral. “Nine. Eight...”

“...Two. One. Zero. Commencing transit.”

After all the anticipation, it was almost disappointing. Apart from a feeling of disorientation in his head and a churning in the pit of his stomach, Fyodor had felt nothing. Sam, though, was unpleasantly green, and had to be helped back to her bunk. The rest of them went at once to the viewscreen, eager to see new stars halfway across the galaxy.

Sam would have been deeply disappointed, thought Fyodor; they looked much the same as the ones they had left behind. But in the distance they faded into blackness.

***

They were just a day out from the wormhole when their navigational sensors began to shut down. A clarifier on the necklin drive, patched with steel instead of whatever strange material its Sergyaran builders were used to, gave way, and the parts to repair it had to be salvaged from the rest of the ship. Very soon all of them, even the Emperor, were working under Lord Aral's direction, trying to keep the ship running on Barrayaran repairs. It was not long before Fyodor and Sam lost their lingering awe of their Emperor and Count’s Heiress; it was hard to be properly respectful to the High Vor when everyone was hanging upside down from the ceiling, covered with sweat and dirt.

Galeni, of course, was equally at ease with everyone. The old man seemed entirely comfortable on the spaceship, suffering from none of the claustrophobia that kept the other Barrayarans awake at nights. Only the Sergyaran, Lord Aral, seemed to keep himself apart from the rest of the Fellowship when he was not instructing them, though he seemed polite enough when spoken to.

Still, Lady Elizabeth persuaded him to sit with the rest of the Fellowship one evening, and tell them about Sergyar. He seemed to open up then, telling long tales of the distant world, its cities and forests and people, the strange plants and animals unlike anything else in the known Nexus, the delicacies of oatmeal and blue cheese at the Viceroy’s table.

“And then there are vampire balloons,” he explained. “Great big iridescent round bubbles – not entirely unlike the haut-ladies’, in appearance – and they have these twisty tendrils with suckers on the end –” He gestured with his hands. “Oh, they have some long scientific name, but everyone calls them vampire balloons. They’ve mostly been driven away from the cities, but in the outlying provinces people still don’t go out alone in the wilderness, and if the livestock strays you may find them in the morning, sucked dry of blood...”

 “You’re joking,” said Padma, wide-eyed.

The Sergyaran shook his head, a smile briefly lighting his face. “No, Lord Padma; I think I'll leave that to you.” He spread his hands. “If you don’t believe me, come to Sergyar. You can see them for yourself.”

But then Vorkosigan looked aside, and his smile faded beneath sudden tension.

“If it’s still there to see,” he finished.

 

***

 

It was three nights later that Fyodor climbed into bed after soldering together what seemed like a thousand makeshift connections in the reactor controls, and fell asleep at once.

His dreams were filled with strange, tortured things, twisted faces – grotesque, inhuman, streaked with the blood of many battles. The air was filled with smoke and the neighing of horses, trampling endless bodies into a mire of blood.

Something grabbed him from under the hooves of a dozen charging warhorses, as the swords of armored warriors began to swing down at his head. Fyodor shot up in his bed and found Padma holding him gingerly with a terrified expression.

“You were screaming in your sleep,” he said. “Something about millions of dead, and, um, burning in blood, and – other things. It was horrible.” He paused. “Um, do you have nightmares like this a lot? Because if you do, no offence, but I think I’d better bunk with Vlad.”

Fyodor sat up, trying to stop himself from shaking. “No,” he whispered. “This is the first time.”  _Then why did it seem so familiar?_ “Could it be the space demons?”

Padma blinked. “Space demons?”

“They live in wormhole tunnels. And eat careless jump-pilots.”

Padma’s eyes went wide. “That’s just an old wives’ tale.”

“How do you know?” Fyodor retorted. “Have you ever been in space before?”

Padma swallowed audibly. “You need something to eat. That’ll help.”

Padma’s solution to all problems; it was no wonder that talk of _being_ eaten seemed to disturb him so much. Fyodor got out of bed and stumbled blindly down the empty passageway, trying to get the stench of blood out of his mind.

He made his way through dimly lit passages to the control room. He found Lord Aral there, wide awake and watching the monitors.

“Can’t sleep?” he asked. Fyodor nodded, and the Sergyaran gestured in welcome. “Join me, then. Look at this.”

Fyodor approached the proximity monitors. They were empty of any large distortions - there were no stars, no planets for light-years around, only dust and gas that hid all light.

“There used to be a star system here, hundreds of years ago," Vorkosigan murmured. "A fleet of refugees from Jackson's Whole fled to it during the Great War. The Cetas tracked them down and vaporized the entire system. This was once the site of a great space battle. In millions of years, there might be a star here again.”

He turned his attention back to the screens. "There is debris still floating around, which is one of the greatest dangers in passing through. I have tracking systems operational for the moment, but I like to be here myself, just to be sure... and to remember, I suppose."

Fyodor nodded, wishing again that Uncle Alexei could have been there. Despite the rumors of terrible war and destruction, this was still the old man's greatest dream come true.

The ring weighed heavily on his neck as he watched the tracks of drifting rocks all around them. He had left his bed with some vague idea of finding comfort, but now Fyodor found that he didn't want to talk - or even think - about the things he'd seen in his sleep. For all his words to Padma, he didn't think it was space demons, but something closer. 

“What's that?” Fyodor asked, seeing an unusual reading. Lord Aral simply reached out and adjusted the viewscreen.

The round shapes that drifted toward them weren't asteroids, though they were more than big enough. As they approached, Fyodor realized that they were metallic, man-made - dark and empty hulks, pockmarked with ancient craters. The Fellowship's ship, which Fyodor had thought large until now, would barely have covered one of their thrusters.

“Those are just pieces of Cetagandan ships,” Lord Aral said softly. “Remnants of the Great War. Those are planet destroyers.” 

Fyodor looked out at the lifeless cloud where a planet had once been, and his heart trembled with fear. “Could they do that to Barrayar?” he asked, dreading the answer as he did so.

Vorkosigan shook his head. “I doubt they have that sort of technology anymore. The Cetas were just as devastated by the Great War as we were. But there were weapons used in that war that I can't imagine. Much of what we know of it is legend and myth; perhaps only one person now living really knows.”

“Giaja?” asked Fyodor uncertainly.

Lord Aral clenched a fist, and then released it slowly. “The Cetagandans aren’t people.”

The Ring abruptly seemed to weigh Fyodor down, pulling him toward the floor, almost choking him. He clutched at the chain.

“Are you all right?” Vorkosigan whispered, rising from his seat.

Some instinct drove Fyodor to look up. Vorkosigan's eyes were dark, intense, and focused on the ring dangling at the end of its chain. His fingers were stretched out to help, but it was not Fyodor's hand he reached for, nor was it concern that Fyodor saw in his face.

Fyodor tightened his fingers around the ring and met the Sergyaran's gaze until he heard a throat being cleared behind them. Lord Aral turned quickly and saw the Emperor watching. The two men stared at each other for a long moment, the tension between them almost visible in the room.

At last Aral Vorkosigan turned back to his controls, and Fyodor quickly tucked the chain with the ring under his shirt.

From the next day on, he kept the ring hidden in his cabin.


	6. A Short Cut to Disaster

On the morning of what was to be their last day in space, Fyodor awoke without nightmares, but instead with a vague feeling of unease to which he could not give a name or cause.  _Something’s going to happen_ , he thought, without knowing why.

He had taken to sleeping on the sofa in the ship's small library compartment, not wishing to wake Padma again. Now he sat up and looked around to see that the holobooks he had fallen asleep reading had been replaced in their places while he slept. On the central table he found only the old book that Count Vorkosigan had given the Emperor. He ran his hands over the soft red leather, pausing to brush the words  _Forward Momentum_  inscribed on the cover in letters of gold.

“Take good care of that book.” Fyodor heard. He jumped and looked around at the half-open door. As usual, he hadn’t noticed Gray -  _Galeni,_  until the old man decided it was time.

“Have you read it?” he asked. Of course Galeni would have read it. Fyodor sometimes thought Galeni must have read every book on Barrayar.

“Oh, yes.” Galeni reached out to touch the leather-bound book with a rare smile. “Surprisingly, it's mostly true. Misleading, though. He makes it all sound so convincing that you finish it believing that every single mad thing he ever did made perfect sense. It wasn't like that for the people reading the reports, I assure you. Or cleaning up his mess. That man was certifiably manic. And, I must admit, quite brilliant.”

“You speak as if you knew him.”

“I did, Fyodor,” Galeni replied. “I knew him very well.”

Fyodor looked at him for a long time. Then he snapped the book shut and put it away. “When I was little,” he said slowly, “I used to think you were a wizard.”

“Everyone in Silvy Vale had their pet theories,” Galeni said. “I know.”

“Yes. Most of them had you being a crazy old wizard of one sort or another. Mine used to be that you were a Vor lord who had lost all his money - I changed my mind about how every year or so. And then a week ago I thought you were a soldier. A spy.”

Fyodor paused and looked up to meet the older man’s eyes. “I always thought you were my friend,” he whispered. “Now I am no longer sure. Galeni, what are you, really?”

“An old man,” answered Galeni, spreading his hands. “A soldier. A spy. And, at the end of it all, Fyodor, your friend.”

That was far from a straight answer, but at least Fyodor thought it was the truth. “And the ring? What is it, really? In that, at least, I have a right to know the truth, Galeni.”

Galeni paused. “Yes,” he agreed at last. “You do.”

He sat down opposite Fyodor and fixed him with a stern gaze. “The ring,” he began, “is not of this world. It was created in a distant universe by a being named Sauron, the Dark Lord of Mordor. He poured all his powers into the ring’s construction, and with it he came very close to destroying that world. But the ring was thrown into the volcano of Orodruin, and Sauron died when it fell.”

Fyodor stared at him. But Galeni seemed entirely serious. “But… ah..." Where exactly was he to start? "The ring isn’t melted or anything. It’s right here.” It was actually locked in the compartment beside his bunk, but Fyodor still wore the chain, and all the other members of the Fellowship seemed to take it for granted that the ring was tucked just under his shirt.

He tried not to think about the deception too much. He hadn't actually lied to any of the others yet, and Sam had seemed to understand when he told her.

“The physical ring was destroyed,” Galeni explained calmly. “But the entity that inhabited it – the portion of Sauron’s power, you might even say a portion of Sauron’s soul – _that_ survived the volcano. Freed of the physical constraints of the ring, it passed through space and time into another universe, where it reappeared in a different form.”

“Our universe,” said Fyodor, struggling to understand. “Barrayar.”

“No, Fyodor.” Galeni shook his head. “All this happened unimaginable years ago. The Ring has passed through many universes since then, leaving a trail of death and destruction behind it. Ours is only one more on the list.

“In every universe, the Ring seeks out a suitable host; someone with strength and anger and ambition, easily tempted by its promises of power. It is patient and cunning; it can wait for centuries, millennia, before the stage is perfect. It drives its host to construct a suitable vessel, an object that it can inhabit and use to exert its growing power. It is a parasite, an infection of the mind, spreading Sauron’s influence through their souls until they themselves become Dark Lords.

“In this universe, it would appear that the Celestial Lord of Cetaganda, Tenar Giaja, was the last chosen host of the Ring. And that –” Galeni gestured to the chain hidden under Fyodor’s shirt - “is its body.”

“But why – why hasn’t anyone done anything about it?” Fyodor stammered. “Can’t anyone stop it?”

“Yes,” said Galeni. “The Valar have tried. They try every time. But they have never succeeded fully. The Ring is seemingly destroyed, and then somehow it re-appears twenty universes away and starts the cycle of destruction all over again. The Valar have tried to explain to me how that works, but I think there are no words for the relevant concepts in any of our languages.”

“The Valar,” Fyodor repeated slowly. He had no idea what the word meant, but somehow it seemed to carry power, reverberating in the air of the cabin.

“The Valar,” said Galeni, “are immortal beings that live in Valinor, outside space and time as we understand them. They were the first, before the universe was created. They are, among many other things, the enemies of the Ring. But the Valar are forbidden from interfering directly in our business. They must choose a messenger to do their work.”

“You,” said Fyodor, understanding. Galeni nodded. Then he said abruptly, “I’m not actually Barrayaran. Did you know that?”

Fyodor shook his head; at this moment nothing that Galeni said would surprise him.

“I was born on Komarr. I was a child when the Barrayarans conquered my planet. My father was a - a patriot, I suppose, at least in the beginning, fighting the invaders. But I went over and joined the Barrayaran military.” He smiled wryly. “I planned to rise through the ranks and join politics, to help the two worlds integrate – maybe even, someday, to become Viceroy. For a while everything was going according to plan. I was working, slowly, to change perceptions, change the laws, to position other Komarrans in spheres of influence. I even found a Barrayaran woman, one of influence, to marry. And then the wormhole closed.”

Galeni closed his eyes. “I still remember the moment the news reached Headquarters. It was chaos on Barrayar, of course, with industries broken and families separated and everyone shouting at everyone else. But for me - all my life I had defined myself as Komarran, even when I tried so hard to look like a Barrayaran. Now, with Komarr as good as gone, what was I? It was impossible to keep working. And in any case I was in Komarran Affairs, what was I even supposed to do?”

Fyodor stared. “And then? What happened?”

“I was sitting in my office writing my resignation letter, when two civilians walked through the door. A locked door, I might add, and the ImpSec HQ of the time was a fortress. As I was reaching for my stunner they sat down at my desk and started to explain how a terrible threat had entered our universe and the Valar required a champion to help destroy it - namely, me. The Ring would come to Barrayar; they didn't know when or how, but they needed me to prepare Barrayar, and to prepare certain Barrayarans.”

“And you accepted.”

Galeni grinned for an instant. “Actually, I arrested them. I thought - well, I'm honestly not sure _what_ I thought, but I was probably imagining some kind of mad plot. It was a paranoid time. But when I brought out a pair of restraints, they just melted away in my hands. And then the two of them stood up and revealed their real forms: as Eonwë, herald of Manwë, King of the Valar, and Ilmarë, the handmaid of Queen Varda Elbereth.” His grin faded to a faint smile. “I needed an anchor badly, back then. I would have grasped at anything. So I accepted.”

 _Elbereth._ For an instant when that name had been spoken, it was as if a spark of light had entered the room, as if some of Fyodor’s invisible burdens had been lifted. “So you are going to destroy the Ring,” Fyodor whispered.

“No.” Galeni looked at him with sudden intensity. “I have been given great powers by the Valar, to use in case of need. But I may not directly take on the Ring. Every time, in every world – only an ordinary being's hand may destroy the Ring. And this time that hand will be yours.”

"What? Galeni! I don't - I'm not - I'm not some sort of hero, I'm not even a spaceman like Uncle Alexei, you've got it wrong-" Fyodor stammered. "I'm not like  _you_ , Galeni!"

Galeni raised a hand, silencing him. "Fyodor, I can't. Even if I hadn't been told so quite unmistakably, I dare not  _touch_  the thing. Even now, I'm thinking of it - with that power I could command unimaginable forces, I could recreate the planet's crust, rebuild Komarr as it might have been - terraformed the way we were planning, a hundred solar mirrors instead of one, domes opening into gardens – tear the Cetagandan army apart, destroy every last weapon and make sure they can _never_ do anything like that again, and make sure it _stays_ that way -”

Galeni fell silent. Fyodor stared at the old man, horrified and fascinated, until his expression lightened and he turned back with a smile that looked only a little forced. 

"You must destroy it, Fyodor," he said. "Don't worry; I'll be around to help. I've waited five hundred years; I can stick around a while longer.”

“But...” Fyodor struggled to come up with something to say. It was all bizarre, unbelievable, and yet he couldn't help believing it. “But this is impossible, Galeni! All of it! You can’t live that long. You _can’t_.”

Galeni smiled again, but this time the smile did not reach his eyes. “Tell that to Lord Mandos.”

“Mandos?” repeated Fyodor.

“Námo Mandos, the Vala of Death,” Galeni said. “He appeared to me shortly after I agreed to be the Valar’s messenger, and blessed me - or cursed me, perhaps, I'm not sure he entirely understands the difference - with long life. He also said that no one would notice anything odd about my living forever unless I wanted them to. It does seem to have worked so far.”

Fyodor tried to envision it - Chief of Imperial Security for almost five hundred years, fighting Imperial wars and plots and crises one after the other, while all around friends grew old and died, and all the while gathering information, waiting for something that might never happen. For the first time he noticed a touch of coldness in Galeni's face, something harsh and brittle with age.

Galeni the Chief of ImpSec was a different face – perhaps a different man - from the mysterious but essentially kind gray wanderer of Silvy Vale, the man who'd brought Fyodor books every year when he was a child. He sat differently, his posture straighter, alert and soldierly. This was a side of Galeni that Fyodor had never been allowed to see before, and he found that he could only pity it.

“Are you...” he hesitated, wondering if he really wanted the answer. “Are you going to live like this forever?”

“No,” replied Galeni. “Only until the job gets done.” He was silent for a while again, this time looking into the distance beyond Fyodor. “I have been promised Valinor, in the end,” he said at last. “I don’t know when that will come. I have been given a glimpse of it once or twice. I saw a green land, full of light… not quite paradise from the point of view of a Komarran, to be honest, but still -”

Suddenly, a scream rang out from down the corridor.

Galeni was on his feet instantly; he was across the room before Fyodor could stand, pushing open the door with one hand, drawing a concealed stunner with the other. In that instant Fyodor knew he had been right; he saw only General Galeni in the man's eyes, and not even a hint of the friendly old Gray Man.

Galeni ran out of the room and down the passage, Fyodor close at his heels as they raced in the direction of the scream. It was a few moments before Fyodor realized that they were heading for his and Padma's cabin.

General Galeni threw open the door, stunner raised, and then stopped. Fyodor pushed his way in and peered around Galeni’s green-uniformed back, and gasped. 

Sam was the one who had screamed. She was lying on the floor beside Fyodor's bunk, writhing in pain, clutching her head in both hands. 

On the forefinger of her right hand was the ring.

Padma was standing in the opposite corner, eyes wide with terror as he stared at the flailing girl. "I - I couldn't stop her!" he almost wailed. "She just came in here and -"

In two strides, Galeni was at Sam's side, kneeling beside her and grasping her shaking hands. “Fool of a Csurik!” he said angrily, pulling the ring off her finger and throwing it to Fyodor in one swift motion. Sam jerked upright and clutched back at his hands, wide-eyed and trembling like a leaf. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry-”

Fyodor felt as though he’d been knocked unconscious and revived. He’d never seen his cousin like this before - never imagined that anything could bring Sam, clever, loyal, brave Sam to such a state. She was pale and sweating, still clutching at Galeni's hands. There were red marks where her nails had dug into her forehead.

“She saw me,” she whispered. “She saw me, and she said… she said…”

“She?” Galeni demanded. “Not he? Not Giaja?” But Sam’s answer was lost in sobs.

And then Fyodor sensed someone else enter the room. A dark shadow, burning with inhuman rage, the same being he had sensed when he had put on the ring in the woods above Vorkosigan Surleau. A man, and yet no ordinary man. By some sense that he could not name or describe Fyodor felt the presence approach him, and it was as though a heavy weight was pressing down on his mind, harder and harder, threatening to break him and grind him into dust. He could not breathe, he felt ready to collapse...

No, thought Fyodor.  _I have to destroy the ring. Galeni needs me. The Valar – whatever they are, wherever they are – they need me._

The pressure was gone as suddenly as it had come. Fyodor looked at Padma and saw the young Vor's eyes blink and half-close as the shadow fell around him.

And then in an instant, the shadow was gone, and Padma relaxed.

“Are you all right?” Fyodor asked quietly. 

Padma’s face was pale. But at last he nodded. “I think so,” he whispered.

Fyodor still hesitated in the doorway, but Padma approached Sam tentatively, kneeling down on her other side to hold her hand. “Who?” He asked, more kindly than Galeni had. “Who was she, Sam? What did she say to you?”

Sam took a deep breath and gulped. “I-”

“General Galeni!” They all turned to see Lady Elizabeth standing in the doorway. Her face was as pale as Sam’s and Padma’s; as pale as Fyodor’s own, probably. Her eyes took in the whole scene, the weeping girl on the floor, the ring, the horrified Fyodor and confused Padma. Finally they settled on Galeni. 

“The haut-lady,” she said. “I sense her. She's coming.”

 

***

 

The five of them rushed to the control room, Galeni dragging an unprotesting Sam along with him. They found Aral Vorkosigan already belted into the pilot’s seat, frantically turning half a dozen engine parameters well beyond their safety limits _._

“How can she be here?” Fyodor asked. “I thought we’d left her back on Barrayar!”

“She must have followed the ring,” Vorkosigan answered, switching off a blaring alarm. “The haut need no wormholes. Their bubbles can pass through five-space at will, though with great expenditure of energy. The haut can pass through solid walls if they want; they transit into five-space and out on the other side-”

Emperor Vlad looked up from the copilot’s screen. “Vorkosigan. I hate to interrupt this fascinating news _which you neglected to tell us until now_ , but there’s a five-spatial anomaly just off the starboard necklin rod.”

“Damn it!” More alarms sounded from somewhere in the ship. Vorkosigan didn’t bother switching these off. “I’m redlining _all_ the thrusters, now. We need to jump into Betan space.”

“You’ll blow up the ship!” protested the Emperor, turning around in his seat. “You told us yourself we were running on makeshift repairs - you’ll kill us all!”

“We’ll all die anyway if she gets to us before we get to Beta!” he retorted. The ship lurched dangerously, throwing Padma off balance and sending him careening into Fyodor. He heard an ominous creaking from beneath the floor as they hauled themselves back up.

“Well, if she can cross five-space at will, she will get to us even if we _do_ get to Beta, so why are you trying to get us killed – aargh!”

Vorkosigan turned his full attention to his console. Like an arrow, like a bird diving for its prey, the ship plunged through the field of floating debris, weaving and twisting, shuddering as it was struck.

“Aral,” called Lady Elizabeth, who was the only one still paying attention to the monitors. “The starboard thruster is gone.”

“Compensating,” he answered, without looking away. “Hold on, now - we’re almost at the jump-point.”

“Too late,” she replied, going still. “She’s here. She’s inside the ship.”

He spun around then, his face draining of color. “I _have_ to make the jump! Get out there! Just keep her busy for ten more minutes!”

She nodded, her eyes wide. Fyodor watched as the lady drew a small hypo from her pocket, uncapped it and plunged it firmly into the vein of her right arm. He caught a glimpse of many more such marks dotting her olive skin has she pulled her sleeve back down. “Tyramine,” she said quickly, noticing his surprise. Then she smiled, rested her hand on his shoulder for a moment, and left the room.

“Beth, wait-” the Emperor half-rose from his seat, his face concerned. Lord Aral gave him a furious glare. “You stay where you are and help me make the jump!”

He spun around. “ _What good will it do?_ ”

“Sire, now is not the time for this!” said Galeni, who was pushing Sam into a chair and helping her strap herself in. “Do as he says!”

Fyodor knew he was useless in the control room; he slipped out and followed Lady Elizabeth as she half-ran through the central corridor of the ship, in the direction of the thrusters.

She stopped abruptly in the middle of the passage and put her hand on the wall. Fyodor paused behind her.

She looked around. “Just about -”

Suddenly a white-hot beam of energy smashed into the ground at her feet. But she had moved an instant before it hit – the heat scorched the flooring and singed her clothes, but missed her. She drew her stunner and raised it as the corridor began to shine with a familiar golden glow.

The haut-bubble rose slowly before them, filling the space from floor to ceiling, shimmering beautifully with its gentle light.

Dread rose in Fyodor’s heart as it approached, as though the terror and power of the haut-lady went before her. He could feel his heart pounding in his chest: _doom, doom_ , it seemed to say, and he shrank back against the wall.

Lady Elizabeth fired the stunner, once, twice, thrice in rapid succession. The beam dissipated harmlessly against the surface of the bubble. The haut floated toward her serenely, and she faced it without any sign of fear, her back straight and stunner still held firm in her hands.

A meter away from her, the bubble stopped.

Fyodor thought he could sense, as if it were a delicate perfume evaporating into the air, a faint sense of irritation from the haut-bubble, then confusion, and at last astonishment.

And then, so suddenly he almost missed the instant it began - _battle_.

The two telepaths stood still as the ship shuddered and trembled around them, locked in a silent conflict that Fyodor could not see. For long minutes they remained rooted to their places; it seemed to Fyodor as if the very air around him crackled with invisible, inhuman power. _Doom_ , it whispered to him.

Then, in an instant, it surged, and something broke. Lady Elizabeth crumpled with a short cry, the stunner dropping from her hand.

The haut-lady’s voice rang in Fyodor’s mind, beautiful and musical. < _Foolish girl. Did you think her powers would be a match for mine? Watch, little human_. >

Lady Elizabeth twisted on the ground. Fyodor could see her face - her features were empty of all expression, her previously sharp eyes suddenly dulled. He watched in horror as she gasped helplessly for breath, and, almost without thinking, his hands scrambled for the ring.

< _Little human. Are you trying to trick me? > _The haut-lady’s voice was amused now. _ <Don’t you realize that I can see every thought that crosses your head?_>

“I can put this on,” Fyodor said. His voice was trembling as he raised the ring before the golden bubble. “I can put this on and make you go away. I did it once before.”

< _Even if you have the courage to wear it, do you think you can stop me from killing her? It will be over in an instant_. _Give me the ring_. > the haut-lady coaxed. < _Give me the ring, Barrayaran, and only then I shall leave the girl alive._ >

“No,” Fyodor whispered, backing away. Before him, his liege-lord's daughter let out a small choking gasp. Fyodor clutched the ring tighter.

< _Truly mortals are foolish_. > The voice sounded amused now. The bubble moved still closer to him. < _I can see the conflict in you._ _Give up, little human. There is no chance left for you, for all your kind. The ring shall be mine, to rule for all eternity_. >

Fyodor took another step back – and felt a pair of hands rest on his shoulders. He twisted around desperately, and saw Duv Galeni’s face, set in a hard, angry expression.

General Galeni pushed Fyodor behind him as he stepped into the corridor to face the haut-bubble.

“I really don’t think so,” Fyodor heard him say. A blazing white light shot out from around him, striking the golden bubble and engulfing it entirely. Fyodor stumbled back against the wall and shielded his eyes.

The haut-bubble’s advance was halted; once again, two powers struggled against each other in the narrow ship’s corridor. “You will not pass!” Galeni said, and the light blazed brighter around him.

The haut emitted a furious shriek, and suddenly the bubble flickered and disappeared. Galeni rested his hand against the wall, looking deeply exhausted, as though all his strength had been drained away from him.

Fyodor gazed at the old man in awe. Galeni looked up and smiled weakly at him. “I told you,” he said, smiling down at Fyodor tiredly. “I'll be here to help.”

“General…” Lady Elizabeth whispered hoarsely from the floor. “Behind you…”

Fyodor spun around, just in time to catch the instant when the golden haut-bubble jumped into existence at the other end of the corridor.

A light flashed.

The disintegrator beam hit Galeni squarely in the back.

“Everybody hang on to something!” cried Lord Aral’s voice over the intercom. “We’re jumping – _now_!” Fyodor clutched wildly for support as the ship began to shudder violently. Behind Galeni’s fallen form, the haut-bubble flickered out of existence as the spaceship made the transition through the wormhole.

Then, suddenly, everything was still.

Fyodor pushed himself up on his hands and knees. He saw Lady Elizabeth doing the same, kneeling on the floor, cradling the wounded man’s head in her lap. Her eyes were wide and horrified as she stared down in horror at the smoking hole in his chest. “ _General Galeni!_ ”

But there was no voice to answer her. Duv Galeni was dead at last.

 

***

 

Half an hour later, Fyodor sat silently in the cold and silent control room, beside Sam, who lay asleep in her chair. Beside her, Lady Elizabeth was still conscious, but looked much worse.

“Well,” said Emperor Vlad at last, gazing down at his unresponsive console, “What do we do now, my lord? Do we sit here and wait for the haut to find us again?”

Fyodor shuddered. All the ship’s power systems had failed soon after they crossed the second wormhole. This time it was beyond repair. They were floating dead in space, weaponless, thrusterless, as perfect a target as any ever invented.

“Don’t worry,” Lord Aral assured them. “We’re in no danger now. The haut can’t follow us into Betan space.”

“Why not?”

Lord Aral smiled. “Wait and see,” he said, with the air of a man preparing a surprise.

“Well then,” the Emperor asked, “do you propose that we all sit here and wait until our oxygen runs out? Because if so, I would far rather face the haut in battle than suffocate to death.”

Lord Aral glanced at the oxygen monitor. “An hour left,” he said, unperturbed. “That should be time enough.”

“Time enough for what? For all of us to witness each other’s wills?”

“Time enough for rescue,” he answered.

“Rescue?” said the Emperor incredulously. “We have no power left to send a message. How do you expect anyone to find us?”

Lord Aral smiled for a moment. “It’s a surprise.”

“A surprise,” repeated the Emperor quietly. “Just how many surprises do you have in store for us, Sergyaran?”

He sat up straighter. “What is that supposed to mean?”

“Be quiet, both of you!” interrupted Lady Elizabeth. “Someone’s coming. I can feel it.”

Half an hour later, just as Sam awoke, a Betan light cruiser took them in tow.

 

***

 

Lord Aral strode confidently out onto the white tarmac of Silica spaceport. The rest of the Fellowship followed more slowly, blinking and shielding their eyes against the harsh Betan light.

Two people awaited them at the edge of the landing pad. “Hello, Lieutenant Dubauer,” Lord Aral cheerfully greeted the one who Fyodor, after a moment’s confusion, decided to assume was a woman.

“Welcome back to Beta, my lord,” replied Dubauer. She glanced around. “You didn’t tell us you’d be bringing a crew this time.”

“Believe me, I didn’t expect them either,” he shrugged. “They’re all right. Mostly.”

The other Betan officer approached Fyodor and held out a hand. “Your passport and visa, please,” he said.

Fyodor looked up at him in bewilderment. “Master Csurik is Our loyal subject,” the Emperor said after a moment’s pause. “We will vouch for his character and conduct.”

The Betan arched his eyebrows. “There's only one of you, so far as I can see. And I suppose you have a passport.”

“Officers,” interjected Lord Aral, “They’re from Barrayar. Their planet’s been isolated from the rest of the galaxy for four centuries.”

Lieutenant Dubauer absorbed this slowly. “You mean - no documents?”

“No documents,” repeated Lord Aral. “Look, Lieutenant, you can’t send them back out, the Cetagandans are hunting for them, they chased us all the way to the border -”

“Sorry, Lord Aral,” replied the immigration officer, “you’ve got a visa. But we can’t let these others pass without proper paperwork. An isolated planet, that’s one month of quarantine at least. They could be carrying all sorts of indigenous diseases-”

“Thank you, Lieutenant,” interjected a gentle voice behind them, “I’ll take it from here.”

They all turned to look at the woman standing on the edge of the landing pad. She was tall and fair, dressed in a formal tan-colored suit, with enormous grey eyes and perfect skin. Her long hair fell to her waist in a mass of fiery red curls. Fyodor would not have believed such beauty could exist, had he not seen it once before, in the forest over Vorkosigan Surleau many nights ago.

Around her index finger she wore a golden ring.

Lady Elizabeth gasped. The Emperor reached for his stunner. “You’re a haut-lady!” exclaimed Sam.

The two Betan officers had moved instantly to put themselves between the woman and the stunner. She waved them away and came forward to give Lord Aral a big hug.

“Hello, kiddo,” she murmured affectionately. “Your father’s been very worried about you.”

“Yes, ma’am,” he answered, embracing her in return. “I’m sorry. It’s good to see you too.”

She released him with a smile and turned to the rest of the fellowship. “Welcome to Beta Colony,” she greeted them. “I’m delighted to meet you all at last.”

Her eyes slowly scanned the amazed group, resting on each of them one by one. Fyodor tried to escape her sight, remembering the last time he had looked at a haut; but he could not hide for long, and when his eyes met hers at last, he felt suddenly lightened, as though all his burdens were lifted away in that clear, piercing gaze. The pain of Galeni’s death, sharp and bitter in his heart, seemed to heal a little for the first time. He could sense his companions relaxing around him, slowly releasing all their pent-up fear and tension. Only Sam whimpered softly when that clear grey gaze alighted on her, and looked down.

In the end her eyes returned once more to Fyodor, but not to his face. She looked down instead to his chest where the ring lay hidden under his shirt, and he realized that she knew exactly why they were here.

Lord Aral turned around to face his companions. “Gentlemen, ladies. Allow me to introduce you to the haut Cordelia Naismith Vorkosigan, dowager Countess Vorkosigan, former Vicereine of Sergyar and Regent-Consort of Barrayar, President of Beta Colony.”


	7. Beta Colony

The Fellowship stayed in peace on Beta Colony for a time, though Fyodor was not sure how long. The people of this strange world lived deep beneath their planet’s surface, isolated from their harsh sun and the cycles of day and night. The air in their underground city was cool and soft, carrying no hint of rain or snow; only a gentle light that changed with the passing of time, but never entirely faded.

It seemed to Fyodor that they did little in that time but walk about admiring the planet, eating strange Betan food, more delicious than anything Fyodor had yet tasted, and resting after their terrifying adventure. Sometimes they met the President Cordelia, and on those occasions they spoke little of their quest, though Fyodor had no doubt she knew why they were there. Yet she seemed more interested in hearing their stories of Barrayar, from Silvy Vale to the strange half-terraformed wilderness of the South Continent, or the stories of the mysterious Duv Galeni - or, more often, interrogating them about the eleventh Count Vorkosigan, or Emperor Gregor the Great, or some other historical figure.

But sometimes their talk would turn to the present. Whispers of war were emerging from all directions, tales of horrible destruction spreading outward from the reoccupied Cetagandan satrapies, expanding steadily in their direction. On those occasions her clear gray eyes would linger on Fyodor longer than usual, and he found it hard to meet them.

“It was like a voice speaking to me in my mind,” said Lady Elizabeth one night, after such a meeting. “Asking me what I’ve ever done - what I can do - what I really think I’m doing, out here in the galaxy.”

“It was different for me,” said Emperor Vlad, looking at her in surprise. “It was like a choice. Asking me who I am and what I want. And what I’m capable of doing to get it.”

Padma shivered a little. “So she’s looking inside our heads? It’s creepy.”

“Don’t say anything like that about Cordelia Vorkosigan!” Lord Aral admonished him. “She’s far greater than you know. She ends wars.” But he did not say what, if anything, he had heard in his mind.

Sam, too, was silent. Fyodor wasn't sure what he saw in her eyes, but it wasn’t the awe and reverence in which the rest of the Fellowship held the former Countess Vorkosigan. But she’d been uncharacteristically subdued since Galeni’s death.

When the others wandered away on another exploration of the tunnels of Silica, he asked her. “Sam. What happened to you, with the ring?”

“It was all like a dream,” she said at last. “I wanted to see what it would do to me. And then I touched it, and I heard _her_ – and she said -”

“Sam,” he asked. “Who was she, and what did she tell you?”

But Sam only shook her head.

“Vlad, Fyodor,” said Lady Elizabeth suddenly, just as Fyodor was about to ask again. “Look at this.”

Fyodor turned to see Lady Elizabeth looking, apparently fascinated, at something on one of the walls. Moving to stand beside her, Fyodor saw the painting that had attracted her attention.

Paintings were rare on Beta Colony; most art seemed to involve metal and plastic, or holography. But this was very traditional, and would not have been out of place on Barrayar. The scene might have been the interior of a spaceship or a space station, all steel and plastic and screens looking out at the stars. Two human figures were in the center of the frame.

On the right was a tall man with white skin and long dark hair, clad in robes with many flowing layers, all of purest white. He stood with his right hand raised, and a golden ring shone on his index finger.

Before him, the smaller figure of a woman in the now-familiar blue uniform of the Betan Expeditionary Force lay crumpled on the steel floor. She seemed badly wounded, but defiant; she was looking straight into the man's eyes, and in one hand she raised a long dagger. Flames were raging around them, and it looked to Fyodor as if the spaceship, or whatever it was, was being torn apart by some unseen force.

Looking more closely, Fyodor could make out a third figure in the background. It was humanoid, but not human; taller than either of the two humans, strong and muscular and covered in golden-brown fur. Long, sharp claws extended from its fingers, and from its back there emerged a mighty pair of wings, lifting it into the air as it flew away from the scene.

“What is this?” wondered the Emperor. Lady Elizabeth reached out to touch the painting, but drew back as her fingers met the spark of a protective force-shield. “Perhaps we should find out,” she said.

But when they met the President that night, the painting was forgotten as she once more began pestering Vlad and Elizabeth for Barrayaran history.

“Who?” Emperor Vlad said, confused.

“You can’t possibly not have heard of Alys Vorpatril!” the President exclaimed. “Even after five hundred years she must be in all your history books. She was one of Gregor’s chief advisors when the wormhole closed. Politician, social dragon, secret agent…”

Illumination dawned on his face. “Oh, do you mean Madame Illyan?”

Her expression was priceless. Then it changed into something else altogether. “They got married,” she said hoarsely. “They got married and I wasn’t even _there_.”

”My lady,” offered Emperor Vlad hesitantly, “I believe I know someone who can answer all your questions.”

He reached into his bag. Then he stood up with an air of formal ceremony, and held out the leather-bound memoirs of Count Miles Vorkosigan.

She stared at it for a long minute. Then she pounced on the book like a mother tigress reunited with a long-lost cub, caressing the real leather beneath her hands, and disappeared for several days.

  


***

Fyodor was glad to sleep in a proper bed once again, albeit in a windowless room far beneath the planet’s inhospitable surface. Yet the comfort did not seem to help his sleep, as he tossed beneath visions of ghostly specters sweeping through a field of battle, felling warriors by the hundreds and thousands, swords and axes clashing and striking deep into bloodstained bodies, arrows singing through the air and into flesh, and then a blazing volcano, a fountain of liquid flame rising far into the sky.

Fyodor rose, sweating, his hands clawing at the air. A dream. It had only been a dream. And yet when had he ever had a dream so vivid? Normal nightmares did not carry with them the heat of the flames, or the cuts of swords. Fyodor’s hand went to the ring, heavy on its chain around his neck once more.

A knock sounded on his door. He padded across the room and opened it to find President Cordelia Vorkosigan standing outside his door fully dressed. She looked him up and down, and Fyodor realized that he was soaked in sweat.

“Come,” she said simply, and Fyodor obeyed, following her down the silent hall.

To his surprise, she led him across the building to her own chambers, which she opened without any key or handle, just a flick of her fingers. Fyodor entered the vast outer sitting-room behind her.

His attention was drawn at once to the bowl of flowers in a corner - a strange extravagance in the spartan room, and the first sign of nature he had seen in the subterranean metallic jungle of Beta Colony. The holo-image beside the flowers was that of an old man in brown and silver, white-haired and thick-bodied, with heavy eyelids covering sharp grey eyes.

Fyodor recognized him, of course. For the five Barrayarans in the fellowship, he was a figure out of ancient legend. For the Dowager Countess, Fyodor realized, he was a husband who'd been dead almost half a millennium. How well could she even remember him? She had known him for less than a tenth of her life. But she hadn’t remarried in all those centuries.

While Fyodor wondered, the President pressed her hand against the wall opposite him. Slowly and soundlessly, the wall slid aside silently to reveal a concealed room behind it. A long table ran its length, and an enormous screen covered the wall opposite. The rest of the walls were filled with monitors and maps.

Her command center, Fyodor realized as he followed her in. The wall closed behind them, leaving no mark to show the entrance, and Fyodor somehow managed not to gawk like a barbarian.

President Cordelia stood before the large screen and raised her hand. The screen flickered on.

“This is the Nexus,” she began. Fyodor looked in wonder at the stellar systems, little flickering spots of light connected by the crisscrossing silvery web of wormhole routes. The Cetagandan Empire was marked out from the rest, a sphere of red enclosing the eight original worlds. Slowly, as he watched, the red began to expand.

“This was the war three centuries ago,” she said. “The Cetagandans hid their plans until it was too late, and we were all taken by surprise when the attack came. Marilac, the Hegen Hub, Komarr…” The wash of red went on expanding, until only Beta Colony, Sergyar, Escobar, and a few frontier worlds remained in white.

Spots of light flickered and died. “Zoave,” said the President. “Komora. Kibou-Daini. The Cetagandans destroyed entire stellar systems and left no trace. No one knew where they would strike next. Billions of people could disappear in a night's assault. There seemed to be no hope, until...”

One far-flung planet, hidden at the extreme end of a chain of wormholes, suddenly expanded to fill the screen. “Until the human race made its final stand at Athos,” said President Cordelia. She looked into Fyodor's eyes solemnly. “I was the leader of that human alliance. I led the Dendarii mercenaries - the only fighting race that could match the Ba in open battle - to Tenar Giaja’s ship, while the Athosians distracted him. I was the one who fought Giaja in the last battle, and I was the one who cut the ring from his finger, just before he escaped and I died.”

“You died?” repeated Fyodor, looking in bewilderment at the very obviously alive woman before him.

“I died,” she repeated. “We were on the command ship of the Star Creche, with the Star Creche's technology all around us. The Dendarii disappeared, but the few human soldiers who stayed with me to the end managed to transfer my consciousness into an empty haut body, just before I died of my wounds and the Cetagandans recovered enough to come after us. Later, we threw it down the mouth of the nearest wormhole. And so here I am, three hundred years later.” She sighed. “Immortal. And tired.”

“So...” Fyodor tried to fit his mind around this story. “You cut the ring from Giaja's finger, my lady. But how did he escape?”

“I let him go,” she answered simply.

Fyodor stopped. He couldn’t have heard that correctly. “You - what?”

“I’ve never been a hired killer, Fyodor,” she told him. “I had him at my mercy, and when the time came, I couldn’t bring myself to murder him. So yes, I cut off the ring and let him go.”

She seemed to read his thoughts. “You wish I hadn’t done it, I suppose.”

“My lady,” said Fyodor at last, “if you had brought yourself to kill him, we would all be safe now. There wouldn’t have been a second war at all. I could be sitting safe at home in Silvy Vale.”

“Perhaps,” she admitted calmly. “Perhaps, if I had done my duty then, the Cetagandan Empire would have been destroyed for good, and the haut would never have risen again. But never underestimate compassion, Fyodor. It is what makes us different from the haut. The haut are beautiful, immortal, perfect - in all ways but one. They have no pity for those less perfect than themselves. If we have none either, what makes us better than them?”

“We –“ Fyodor faltered. _The Cetagandans aren’t people_ , Lord Aral’s cold voice said in his head, and President Cordelia’s eyes narrowed.

“Are they not?” She moved forward; her hand rested against the screen for a moment, and the red image faded slowly into darkness. “Think what you would be, if someone else had absolute power over you – someone else could take your mind and command it at will, and there would be nothing you could do but sit inside, watching – and screaming.”

Fyodor was silent. “You’ve met one of the haut,” she whispered. “One of seven, but in the old days there were many; yet Tenar Giaja was more powerful than all of them put together. There was a time when he had such power that he might reach from his throne on Eta Ceta and take control of someone’s mind, anywhere; he could watch through their eyes, speak through their voices, and no one knew who to trust, or who to believe... the poor, tortured soul.” The last words were spoken in a whisper, and Fyodor blinked up at her.

She shook her head. “It wasn't all his own power. Nor was all he did his own doing, I believe.” Her eyes went slowly down to the hidden ring. “But you know what I’m talking about, don’t you? Ringbearer.”

She knew. She might not know the true nature of the ring as Galeni had, but Fyodor thought perhaps she knew the ring itself more truly than he had. “You held it,” he whispered. “And you threw it away. What… what was it like, for you?”

She gave him a long look. “I know what you mean,” she answered. “The ring has many powers. It will tempt each with their greatest desires, and terrify them with their deepest fears, all the while twisting them to serve its own dark purpose. Don’t listen to it, Fyodor. The ring is clever, and subtle, and has only one aim in whatever passes for its mind. All this way it has sought, and is seeking, and will seek to manipulate you and your friends, and unless you are prepared for it, it will succeed.”

“What did it tempt you with?” he asked.

“Power,” she answered quietly. “Had I held it longer, it might have come to know me better, but power has always been its first and greatest weapon. And absolute control of an empire of millions is a staggering amount of power to offer.”

“You mean - I can control the Cetagandans?” he asked. “I can make them do what I want?”

“The ring is telepathic, and it may allow its wearer use of that power,” she said. “Yes – with it on your finger you can make beings close to you walk or talk, kill or die at your pleasure, for as long as your mind has the strength to channel the ring’s power. But I would advise you not to try. Do not use it except in the very greatest need, for it will draw the attention of all the haut, and give the ring a hold on your mind. Every time you put it on, it will be harder to take it off.”

She lowered her voice. “But above all, Fyodor, Giaja must not get the ring back. If he holds the ring and the Great Key together, as he once did, he will have absolute power over every Cetagandan Ba, Ghem or Haut. With all of them acting as a united force, we would die. At the moment we’re alive only because Giaja is forced to rely on his servants’ loyalty and obedience – and his treatment of his subordinates has never been such as to inspire loyalty.”

“And if he doesn’t get the ring?” Fyodor asked. “If we hide it from him?”

“Then it’ll take him a little while longer,” she said calmly. “Here, in my own home, with my powers at full strength, I can hold off one haut-lady, even two or three. If all seven come against me at once, I might well lose. If the Celestial Lord comes himself, I _will_ lose. And once Beta Colony is taken…”

“Barrayar,” whispered Fyodor. In his mind he saw Silvy Vale consumed by fire, atomic explosions over Vorkosigan Surleau…

“Yes,” said the President, watching his face. “Yes, Fyodor. That’s what will happen if Giaja succeeds. That’s what will happen if you fail.”

Fyodor looked back at her, and in a sickening moment, realized that he _must_ fail. How could he not? He was just a boy from the Dendarii mountains, not a soldier or a strategist or a telepath. With immortal, powerful Duv Galeni at his back, he might have succeeded. But now - how could he possibly take on the vast armies of Cetaganda all by himself? How could he take on the powers of the haut? In the end he must surely fail, and all would fail with him.

And if that was so, there was only one thing he could do. He drew the ring out from under his shirt and pulled off the chain. It wrenched at his heart, as if he was tearing away a part of himself, leaving a gaping hole in a place that had never existed before. But he did it without flinching.

“My lady,” he said, holding it out to the President. “Please. Take the ring.”

Her eyes widened in surprise. “Why?”

“You could fight Giaja with this,” he said. “You could win again. You'd be a wise and noble queen. You wouldn’t hurt Silvy Vale. I can’t defeat the haut, milady, but maybe I can save us all by giving it to someone better.”

She raised one elegant eyebrow. “In case it has escaped your notice, I too am haut.”

“My lady,” he answered, “you’re Vorkosigan. Count Vorkosigan is my liege-lord. You are of his House, and therefore I owe you my loyalty. If you were to take the ring and rule in place of Giaja, I would serve you in any way I could.”

Her lips twitched. “How very Barrayaran. I’d almost missed that. But what in the world makes you think I want to rule the Nexus?”

He blinked at her. “Um. You don’t?”

“Fyodor,” she said quietly, “ruling is a lonely job. I’ve lived over half a millennium, now. I’ve been a ship captain, a Vicereine, and now a President. But the happiest years of my life was when I was with Aral on Barrayar, and our friends and family were there around us, and I ruled nothing at all. I know what power is. Compared to people who love you, it’s nothing.”

She extended her hand, and instead of taking the ring she closed his fingers over it. “You will succeed," she said. "I trust you, Fyodor, and I think that when the time comes, you may surprise even yourself. But enough for tonight. Now sleep.”

His eyes closed instantly, and her arms caught him just before he hit the ground.

  


***

  


The next morning, the Fellowship sat together at breakfast as usual. “This is fabulous,” said Padma, shamelessly taking a fourth helping. “I could go on eating Betan food for the rest of my life!”

“Unfortunately,” said President Cordelia, entering the room, “you’re leaving today.”

Everyone looked up. “Today?” said Sam. “Oh, why?”

“The Cetagandans attacked Escobar in full force four days ago,” President Cordelia said quietly. Her voice was calm; only her eyes held traces of horror, and of ancient and terrible memories that were now resurfacing to become the present. “According to the refugees that survived to reach us, the haut-lady Degtiar led the assault in person. They burned the entire planet down to the crust. It’s Komarr again. There is no life remaining on Escobar.”

For several seconds the Fellowship could only stared at her in disbelief. Fyodor couldn’t imagine what to say. The Enemy had destroyed an entire planet - women, children, plants, animals, everything right down to single-celled life. However he tried, Fyodor found that he could not begin to fathom such destruction, let alone the mind of the person who had ordered it.

“Yes,” said the Emperor after a long minute. “You are right, milady. We have lingered here too long. We have a mission to complete.”

“But where do we go?” asked Fyodor, finally giving voice to the question that had troubled him since their departure from Barrayar. “I do not know the way to Eta Ceta.”

“Neither do I,” replied President Cordelia. “But I can promise you that it doesn’t lead through Beta Colony. If you want my advice, Ringbearer, it’s this – go to Escobar, or whatever’s left of it. There you may find a way to your ultimate destination, or else you may choose to go on with your friends to the Viceroy at Chaos Colony.”

“But, ma’am,” said Lord Aral, “our ship…”

“Ah,” she smiled beautifully. “I’m not sending you out in that wreck, love. Come with me.”

They followed her out to the back of the great house, where a Betan aide was waiting for them with her arms full of strange bags and boxes. More interesting was the sleek brown-and-silver jumpship that filled the open space. The name _Naismith_ was printed on its side in letters of gold.

Lord Aral gave an admiring whistle. “Mine?”

“Yours,” she answered, tossing the code-keys into his hand. “It’s got all the usual stealth technology, of course, and the most powerful plasma weaponry we could fit in - but lately we’ve been experimenting with telepathic blocking agents, too. They’re still not very effective at close range, but over long distances, this should be invisible even to the haut. Unless they’re looking for it.”

"Thank you, ma'am," he grinned, running his hands over the gleaming hull. "It's magnificent."

The President smiled at him and glided across the room to Emperor Vlad. “And this is for _you_.” She took a dark folded cloth from the waiting aide and placed it in the Emperor's arms.

He lifted one fold and drew in a sharp breath. Fyodor caught a glimpse of silver before he folded it back.

“I believe that the time is not far when you will use it. When you see the Viceroy at Chaos Colony, you may tell him that you have my complete support - Sire.”

Lord Aral looked up sharply from his new ship, and Fyodor saw his expression grow still as the President pulled Vlad into a tight embrace. “Oh, love, please do be careful. You’re so much like him.” She let him go at last, placing her hands on his shoulders and looking into his eyes. “He became a great Emperor, in the end,” she whispered. “I believe that you will be one, too.”

She left him at last and turned to Lady Elizabeth. “You've been quiet for a while, haven't you?” she said. “Tell me what you want, and if I can give it to you, I will.”

The lady bowed her head. “I... I came on this quest to fight the haut,” she said at last. “I thought I could put my powers to some use at last. And after meeting one of them, I think I might just as well have stayed at home.”

“You’re a Vorkosigan,” the President told her. “If that haut had the slightest bit of sense, she’d have run screaming from you. But if you have doubts…” she took a small hypospray from her aide's hand and uncapped it. Lady Elizabeth automatically held out her hand to receive the injection.

“There,” said President Cordelia in a satisfied voice. “The entire Durona group’s been working day and night to synthesize that for you. That will increase your body’s tyramine production and get it past the blood-brain barrier. Next time you meet that haut-lady, I promise you she’ll be in for a surprise.” Lady Elizabeth’s eyes gleamed.

“That was from the Duronas,” continued the President. “This is from me.” She drew from her belt a dagger with the Vorkosigan seal on its hilt, and offered it hilt-first to her descendant. Fyodor recognized it as the one they had seen before the painting, its pieces now made whole.

“This is the dagger that cut the ring from Tenar Giaja three hundred years ago. It broke back then; I've had it remade. This is laced with enough synthetic poisons to match even the haut’s regenerative powers. I hope it never comes to hand-to-hand combat for you, but just in case...”

Lady Elizabeth took the dagger and slipped it into her belt. “On my word as Vorkosigan,” she whispered, “I’ll put your gifts to good use.”

Sam was next. President Cordelia placed a small metallic object in her hands. It looked a little like a comlink to Fyodor. “This is a neutronic beacon,” she said, “with a signal radius of ten light-minutes. The signal can penetrate a planetary atmosphere, and can’t be blocked or interfered with by anything we know. You may use it to raise the alarm when you are in danger, or to warn your friends of danger, or for other things.”

She lowered her voice. “Listen to me, Samaria. The rest of the haut believe that beauty, intelligence, strength and immortality are perfection. But I am also haut, and I am telling you that they’re wrong. Perfection is what you do with them.”

“My lady,” Sam answered softly, looking down.

And then at last the President left her and turned to Fyodor. “And now, Ringbearer, it’s your turn.”

Fyodor wondered what weapon she would give him for his hopeless quest. She did not turn to the aide, who was still holding one box. Instead she drew something from her pocket and pressed it into his hands. Fyodor looked down. To his surprise, it was a long coil of hair, dark and shining and twisted around and around in circles, with tiny golden beads fastened in it in a complicated pattern.

But, thought Fyodor in confusion, her hair was red.

“This,” President Cordelia whispered in his ear, her voice too low to be heard by anyone else, “is the hair of the haut Rian Degtiar, once Empress of Cetaganda. It was given by her to my son Miles, and, well, I actually don’t know how it got here. I suppose Pym somehow managed to pack it with my luggage when we came to Chaos Colony.” She closed his hands around it. “It’s all I have to remember my son by, so take good care of it, Fyodor. Use it well.”

Fyodor tried to hide his disappointment as he thanked her politely. He could see all the others looking on curiously, wondering what he hid in his hands. He thrust it quickly into his pocket, not wanting them to see. He couldn’t imagine what he might use it for. Could the passage of centuries have addled her brain?

She turned and moved away from him, but her strangely accented voice echoed in Fyodor’s mind. < _At the end, ringbearer, look for me. I’ll be there_. >

Padma was practically dancing with impatience. “Me? What about me?”

“Ah, yes.” She smiled. “You’re lucky, kiddo. You have the most useful gift of all.” He beamed. She handed him a large box and waited expectantly.

Everyone stared at the box. There were wads of fluffy tissue paper sticking out from the edges. A strange buzzing sound emanated from it. The lid had… air holes?

Padma lifted the lid and let out a horrified shriek, almost dropping the box on his foot. Fyodor peered over his trembling shoulder. “Ugh!”

Inside the box was a large insect the size of Fyodor’s palm. Very like a giant cockroach, except that it was bright green. Its long antennae waved around curiously as the rest of the group gathered around to look.

“You don’t even have to feed it,” said the President cheerfully. “It’s photosynthetic. Guaranteed minimum lifespan of five Betan years. There’s even an insurance policy somewhere.”

Padma was almost in tears. “You’re giving me an insect? An _insect_?”

She raised an eyebrow. “I thought you were fond of Betan food, Lord Padma.”

“You want me to eat a bug?” he cried.

“Oh, no! Certainly not the bug, it would be terribly indigestible. Look, I’ll show you.” She stroked the bug’s back gently with her finger. It opened its mouth and a large, squishy yellow-white blob popped out onto her hand. The President picked it up between two fingers and held it out to Padma expectantly.

“You want me to eat bug _vomit_?” Padma sounded close to hysterical now.

“Bug butter,” she corrected him gently. “This is like bread for us Betans. One handful contains your daily requirement of all essential nutrients. Perfect thing for ship rations. Didn’t anyone tell you? All the food you’ve eaten here used bug butter as a base.”

She looked around at their green faces, her eyes twinkling with amusement. “I’m sorry?” she asked. “Is something wrong?”


	8. The Fellowship at Escobar

The Fellowship departed from Beta Colony that very day, their new jumpship carrying them safely through three wormholes in quick succession. Two days later, they completed their final transit and entered the star system of Escobar. Lord Aral waited for a long time before approaching the abandoned battlefield, running careful scans of the local space.

“Elizabeth,” he said, “I’m getting faint distortions at these coordinates. Can you tell anything at this range?”

She closed her eyes. “Not easily... wait. Yes.” Her face slowly turned pale. “Haut,” she announced at last. “Five of them, and, and there are many – many things, more than I can count, hundreds of thousands, they’re sort of human, but not like anything I’ve seen-”

“Ba,” he said sharply. “Ghem too, if there are that many of them.” He bent over his console. “We’d best land on Escobar,” he announced after a few minutes. “Our Betan shields may have held so far, but I’d rather not risk them against five haut at once. We’ll wait on the surface until they pass.”

No one wished to argue with this, and slowly the _Naismith_ began to descend toward the ruined world of Escobar. Fyodor and Padma peered curiously out of the window at the barren surface of the planet. Lord Aral picked a landing spot which he said had once been the capital city, but all that Fyodor could see as they landed was a landscape of charred and blackened ruins.

“Three of the haut and all the others have passed out of range,” Lady Elizabeth said. “Only two haut remain. They don’t seem to be in any hurry to leave.”

“What could they want here?” wondered Emperor Vlad. “They’ve already exterminated the entire planet. What is left?”

“Us,” answered Lord Aral shortly. “We were followed to Beta. They’ve probably been watching the wormholes ever since, waiting for us to come out.”

“But then – the other three haut, those ships, the soldiers-”

Lady Elizabeth answered him. “Beta Colony,” she said softly. “They’re all going to Beta Colony.”

 

***

 

“There’s nothing left,” Vlad murmured, looking at the expanse of ash and rubble; all that remained of the capital of Escobar. The Fellowship had split up to explore the planet, not that there was much left to see. “A billion people on this world, and now there is just – nothing.”

A few feet away, Elizabeth was walking slowly in a large circle, gazing down into the plascrete dust. “There,” she said cryptically, kneeling down. “Look.”

Vlad knelt down beside her and saw two tiny blackbirds, only half the size of her hand. They were thin and haggard, with bare clumps on their backs where feathers had fallen off, but they were still hopping in between the chunks of charred plascrete.

“That’s almost a miracle,” he said in wonderment. “How could they possibly have survived that?”

“Doesn’t life always find a way?” Elizabeth smiled, breaking a few pieces off her ration bar. “Poor things, they look almost starved.” She closed her eyes and concentrated for a moment. The birds stopped, turning their eyes to look at her. The next instant they took off and fluttered into her outstretched hand, pecking voraciously at the crumbs. When they made to fly away, she stroked their feathers and they calmed down, looking up at her through beady golden eyes and making soft chirruping sounds.

“We’d better keep them with us,” she said, gathering them close. “They’ll starve to death if we leave them here. They can eat the bug butter.”

The birds settled comfortably in her hands, making no attempt to even flutter their wings. Vlad was tremendously impressed. “You’ve never been able to do that before.”

“No,” she agreed. “I can feel the Betan treatment working. I think…”

< _I think I can do a lot more now_. >

Vlad gaped at her. “You can…”

“And it’s just started,” she said, smiling. “It’s still working, even now. It's growing stronger with every minute. I think I can do things I haven't even imagined yet.”

Slowly, Vlad began to smile back at her. “That’s wonderful. I can't wait to find out what they are.”

“Fighting the haut,” she answered instantly. “I'm not strong enough for that yet, but I'm going to be. I have to be.”

“You will be,” Vlad promised, reaching out to touch her shoulder. He was about to say more when she pulled away and turned to look over her shoulder. Vlad rose, reaching instinctively for his stunner, and five seconds later, he heard approaching footsteps.

“Oh, it’s you,” he said, looking at Aral in annoyance.

“I wanted to discuss something with you,” said Aral, without preamble. “I've been thinking about our plans, and I think you two have been doing the same.”

Vlad made a noncommittal gesture. Elizabeth got to her feet as well, and the birds fluttered up to perch peacefully on her shoulders.

“The haut are going to go away eventually,” Aral went on. “And we’ll be able to continue our journey.”

“So?”

“So the question is: what do we do then?” He spread his hands. “I said so in the beginning – I’m going home. But what about the rest of you?”

“There is no question,” Vlad said. “We both wish to come to Sergyar with you.”

Elizabeth cleared her throat. “Actually,” she began, “I think we should all go on to Eta Ceta.”

Both men turned to her in surprise.

“And how are we supposed to do that?” asked Aral. “Haven’t you been listening to a thing I’ve said? No one even knows where Eta Ceta _is_!”

Elizabeth was unperturbed. “Well then, we must simply search for it.”

“And while we search?” Aral snapped back. “We could scan the whole of known space for centuries and still not find it, and all the while the Cetagandans might be at Sergyar, turning it into _this_.” He swept a hand to indicate the carnage around them. “Is that what you want?”

“From what I see,” she retorted, “if we fail to destroy the ring, the Cetagandans will destroy Sergyar and everything else anyway – and if you still harbor that plan of making use of the ring, I _tell_ you that would be an equal disaster. So what have we to lose?”

“Beth,” said Vlad, “You know I must go to Sergyar. It’s still part of my Empire. Its people are still my people, and my place is with them.”

“Sergyar has no Emperor,” Aral repeated stiffly. “Sergyar needs no Emperor, and especially not a Barrayaran one who knows nothing about us, who’s never seen Sergyar in his entire life, raised on a planet stuck centuries behind the rest of the galaxy-”

“Either way,” Elizabeth interrupted before Vlad could speak, “you can protect your people best by helping Fyodor in his quest, Vlad. Unless you want the throne of Sergyar so badly you’re willing to sacrifice Sergyar itself to get it?”

Vlad turned from Aral to stare at her in astonishment, and so did not notice Fyodor and Padma approaching from the distance. She took a deep breath. “Vlad, I think we should take a vote on this.”

“A vote?” Vlad’s eyebrows flew up at this sedition from so unexpected a source. “Since when have you become a democrat, Beth?”

“I’m with Beth!” Padma announced, coming up to the group. “I think we should all go to Eta Ceta.”

Vlad restrained himself with an effort. “We are _not_ going to have a vote.”

“Of course not,” agreed Padma. “There’s no point. Fyodor has to go to Eta Ceta, and we have only one ship.”

There was an awkward silence; then, as one, the entire Fellowship turned to Fyodor.

“Why does he have to go?” Aral said. He took a step forward. “Fyodor, listen, you know this whole plan was insane from the beginning. We can save Sergyar even now. Come with us, just get the Great Seal to the Viceroy my father, and he can use it to hold off the haut-”

Elizabeth opened her mouth angrily, but Vlad got there first. “To the Viceroy your father?” he interrupted coldly.

Aral turned around. “Oh, of course, the great Emperor Vlad wants to wear the ring himself. It would be very convenient for you, wouldn’t it, to be the hero who saves Sergyar. What makes you think you have that right? My family has ruled Sergyar for five centuries-”

“Your family swore an oath to rule Sergyar in the name of the Emperor of Barrayar,” Vlad retorted. “Is this what the word of a Vorkosigan has come to in five centuries?”

Aral drew in a sharp breath. “Sergyar is not your frontier colony anymore,” he said after a minute. “We spent centuries advancing far beyond your wildest dreams, while your planet slipped behind the rest of the galaxy. You don’t want a planet to rule, you want a planet to exploit. We’re not fools, you know. What could you possibly give us now?”

“Your honor,” said Vlad quietly.

“Enough!” Fyodor interrupted. Everyone turned to him. “I must go to Eta Ceta,” he said. “But I will not force any of you to come with me. If you intend to take the ship to Sergyar, then either take me by force or leave me here. The choice is yours.”

With that, he walked away, leaving the others staring after him in silence.

***

 

Fyodor found Sam in the ruins, sitting quietly beneath a blackened remnant of a wall and fiddling with her beacon. “Hello, Sam.” His stomach gave a low growl as he sat down beside her. By unspoken agreement, the five Barrayarans were still rationing out the food they’d brought from home, leaving Lord Aral to enjoy the bug butter by himself. He got no answer, so he pulled out his book and started reading, trying to distract himself from the scene he'd just left.

After a while Sam looked up curiously. “What’re you reading?” she asked.

“The Emperor lent it to me. Look.” He held up the memoirs. “Here, this is the part I’m on.”

 _She floated closer, and raised one fine hand to touch my left cheek. It was the first time we had touched.  
_ _"I have taken much from you," she spoke quietly, "and given nothing."  
_ _"It's the haut way, is it not?" I said bitterly.  
_ _"It is the only way I know." From her sleeve, she removed a dark and shining coil, rather like a bracelet. A tiny hank of silken hair, very long, wound around and around until it seemed to have no end. "Here. It was all I could think of."  
_ _I took the coil from her. It was cool and smooth in my hand. "What does this signify? To you?"  
_ _"I . . . truly do not know," she confessed._

Sam sighed. “How romantic.”

Fyodor drew out the coil of hair from his pocket and showed it to her. “This is what she gave me. President Cordelia, I mean.”

Sam’s eyes widened in surprise. “Sam,” he asked, “can you think of any possible way this could be of any use to anybody?”

Sam thought for a while before shaking her head. “That’s what I thought.” Fyodor put the book away and held out his hand to help Sam up. Together, they began to walk through the ruins of the city. “I thought it might be some sort of secret weapon, but it’s not even that. It’s just hair.” He sighed, looking at Sam’s beacon. “At least that could be useful someday.” He was now almost convinced that the Betan President, great and famous as she undoubtedly was, might not be entirely in her right mind. Did her electorate know? Did anyone on Beta Colony actually vote for her, or could she manipulate them all into it?

“She saw into my mind,” Sam said softly. “She knew what I wanted.”

Fyodor looked up. “What?”

But Sam was silent. She was still looking green from jump-sickness, he noticed. The several jumps from Beta to Escobar had taken their toll on her.

Fyodor took off the ring and stared at it, watching the shadows dance across its surface. “They’re all fighting back there,” he told her. “I don’t like this place, Sam. I wish we could leave. If only the haut weren’t waiting.”

“The haut,” she breathed. “They’re beautiful, Fyodor. They’re the most beautiful things I’ve ever seen. They’re so _perfect_.”

Fyodor looked at her in surprise now. “They’re cruel and merciless, Sam. Look at what they did.” He gestured to the blackened land around them. “After seeing this - I don’t think there’s anything to envy in the haut. There are people back home in Silvy Vale I’d rather be.”

Sam looked back at him in even greater astonishment, as if she was seeing him clearly for the first time. “Is that what you really think, Fyodor?” she asked. “You’d rather be old and sick and poor and ugly?”

“I’d rather be human. Wouldn’t you?”

“No,” she said. “No, I wouldn’t.” And before he could react, she seized the ring from his hand.

“Sam!” cried Fyodor in horror, pulling away. But it was too late. She had switched on the beacon, and even as Fyodor watched dumbstruck she raised it to the skies, projecting out through the atmosphere to where the haut waited.

“Oh, Sam,” he whispered, sickened to his heart. “Why?”

“She promised me,” she answered. “When I put on the ring – she saw me with her mind, and she promised that she’d make me a haut-lady. Once I give her the ring and she has power, she’ll use it for me, she’ll put me in a haut body. I didn’t believe her, I didn’t think it was possible to _do_ that, until I saw Lady Cordelia –”

“And then you’ll be bound to her service,” Fyodor put in. “You’ll be her slave, Sam. Is it worth it, really?” He kept his eyes locked on hers, but his hand moved closer to his belt.

“You can come too,” said Sam, her eyes shining. “She’ll listen to me, once she has the ring she can get rid of her Emperor and do whatever she wants, she can do it for both of us-”

 _I’m sorry,_ thought Fyodor, and fired the stunner.

Sam fell, and he quickly knelt down beside her, pulling the ring out of her hand, his hands trembling in his haste. But before he could return it to its place, an explosive force blasted him off his feet. He landed heavily on the ground several feet away, and looked up dizzily to see the golden force-bubble floating before the smoking hole where he had stood a moment before. From the corner of his eye he saw the leather-bound book flying off far into the distance, thrown by the force of the blast.

A second bubble, this one pearl-gray, materialized slowly beside the first. And the ring – the ring was lying on the ground beside Sam’s unconscious body. As Fyodor watched, there was a sudden hiss from one of the bubbles. Sam and the ring both rose from the ground and began to float toward the haut.

Fyodor threw himself forward and grabbed the ring in both hands, landing on the ground just as Sam disappeared into the surface of the gray bubble. He scrambled to his feet, clutching the ring close to his heart. There was a moment’s pause, as he stared at the haut and the two haut might or might not have stared back at him from behind their impenetrable screens. Then he turned and fled.

Behind him, the gray force-bubble soared into the sky like a terrible bird of prey, carrying Sam with it. The golden bubble shot forward, following Fyodor’s running figure across the burned landscape.

Fyodor tried to run faster. But as he ran he felt the haut reaching out to him with her mind, felt her power weaving around the nerves in his legs and slowing him down. Each step he took became harder and harder, until his feet felt as though they were made of lead. Another moment and that white-hot beam would blast his chest into atoms just as it had Galeni’s.

Fyodor could feel the ring growing warmer, throbbing in his hands, within his mind, calling out to him. _Do not use it except in the very greatest need_ , President Cordelia had said. But it was the only way, it was either this or death, surrendering the ring to the haut, unimaginable destruction…

The haut was almost upon Fyodor when he spun around and put the ring on his finger.

Instantly, the golden bubble halted in front of him. Once again, as he had in the woods above Vorkosigan Surleau so long ago, Fyodor could suddenly see the haut-lady’s mind laid open before him, cold and hard and powerful. But she was prepared this time, for she had studied him too, and resisted him with strength that matched his own…

Frustration and rage welled up inside Fyodor, even as the power of the haut pressed against his mind. She had killed Galeni, shot him in the back, without honor. She and her kind had destroyed entire worlds. She was a monster who exterminated men, women and children by the billions, people who had done her no harm and never would.

She did not deserve to live.

Fyodor did not stop to question. He caught the haut-lady's mind in his, and _held_ it, pouring all his hatred and anger into the connection that bound their thoughts. An unseen force battered against his mind, but he ignored the attack and held firm. He could feel the ring fueling his anger, and he allowed it to do so, welcoming it into its mind, embracing the power that flooded into his mind.

He felt the haut-lady’s surge of terror, her last desperate attempts to defend herself – and then he broke down the last barrier and willed her to _end_ , and for one brief and triumphant moment he tasted her defeat.

The golden bubble blinked out of existence. The tall and slender haut-lady sat before Fyodor on her float-chair of woven gold, her perfect ivory skin slowly turning a choked blue, her elegant hands involuntarily clutching at her throat. Then she tumbled out of the chair and lay crumpled at Fyodor’s feet, gasping for breath.

Fyodor stepped back from her, repelled, and waited until the body stopped twitching. There. It was done. She was dead. She had what she deserved.

He stood there gazing at the fallen haut, filled with righteousness and revulsion, and then Fyodor heard another voice in the recesses of his mind; a voice utterly cold and inhuman, and ancient beyond the ages of the world.

< _Good_. > whispered the Ring of Sauron. < _Very good_. >

 

***

 

Vlad and Aral were still shouting at each other when Elizabeth stood up and gasped, “Haut! Two of them! Here! Now!”

They stopped at once. Vlad pushed Elizabeth in the direction of the ship. “Run! I’ll get the others-”

“You both get back to the ship,” said Aral. “I’m faster, I’ll get them.” Before Vlad could object he was off, running back in the direction of the ruins.

Vlad grabbed Elizabeth's hand and they both ran toward the _Naismith_. They had just reached the foot of the hill where the ship was waiting, when the pearl-gray force-bubble began to rise in the distance.

They staggered up the hill, sweating and puffing, and Vlad pushed Elizabeth into the ship first. She was still staring out of the door. “What about Aral? Can you see him?”

Vlad turned and looked out in the direction of the ruins, but he could not see Aral, nor any of the others. Should they not have been within sight by now? Then he went still, understanding. “No – oh, no.”

Elizabeth turned. “What?”

“I’m an idiot,” Vlad said wildly. “Why did I let him go? He isn’t going to fetch them. He’s decided it’s time to go for the ring.”

He drew Elizabeth from the door, to the ship’s controls. She kept glancing over her shoulder. “You need to stay here,” he said. “Get the ship set for launch. If the haut-lady comes this way, don’t wait for me.”

Her eyes widened as she realized what he was going to do. “No – Vlad, wait!” But Vlad was already out of the door and racing back down the hill.

None of the others were anywhere in sight as he made his way through the rubble and ash of the ruined city. He was about to turn away when he heard a cry. Turning, he made his way along the edge of a charred wall until he heard another cry. Kneeling down, he glanced quickly around the crumbling edge of the wall.

Vorkosigan’s strange green uniform stood out clearly against the blackened ruins. Vlad could see the Sergyaran lying crumpled on the ground. His eyes were open, but he made no attempt to rise. After a moment Vlad realized why. Part of his right leg was missing, blown to pieces by the haut-lady’s terrible weapon. The wound wasn’t bleeding, cauterized by the heat, but he could not rise from the ground.

Vlad’s eyes rose upward, to the golden haut-bubble that glittered above Aral. He tensed, expecting to see the white-hot beam blast the wounded man to atoms at any moment. But instead, Aral twisted on the ground and let out another short cry of pain. Vlad saw him clenching his teeth tightly, holding back a scream.

 _We are toys to her_ , Vlad thought, anger surging up in his chest as he realized what was happening. The haut would not take them all at once, though she undoubtedly could; she would have her fun, like a spoiled child pulling wings off flies. Had they played like this with the people of Escobar, too?

The Sergyaran was still writhing on the ground. Vlad saw his head turn, and then his eyes widened as he caught sight of Vlad half-hidden behind the wall.

Vlad hesitated. He shifted, uncertain, and his hand struck against something soft. He looked down.

The leather-bound memoirs of Count Miles Vorkosigan lay half-open across the top of the burned-out wall. Vlad reached for it, bewildered. _Didn't I give this to Fyodor?_

_"I wouldn't have called it a lecture. Just a useful distinction, to clarify thought." He spread his hand, palm up, in a gesture of balance. Reputation is what other people know about you. Honor is what you know about yourself."_

_Oh._ Vlad took a deep breath.

Taking two steps back, he detached an explosive charge from his belt. Taking careful aim, he threw it, as far as he could, away from the haut. Then he dropped and covered his ears as a deafening blast rang out and a distant wall crumbled in a cloud of dust.

The silvery bubble rose higher in the air. In the brief moments that the haut-lady was distracted, Vlad darted out of his hiding place and dragged Aral out of her way.

“Are you crazy?” Aral managed to say as Vlad picked him up across his shoulders with a grunt. But he was already moving, running back up the path, puffing for breath.

The moment didn’t last long; there was a hissing sound and a white-hot blast missed them narrowly. Vlad cursed and zigzagged up the hill, dodging a disintegrator ray to his left. Aral clutched his shoulders. “This is insane! You can’t-” His words were cut off as the next blast tore off the ground right in front of them, sending them tumbling down into the dust together.

The silvery bubble rose above them, shining so brightly that it dazzled their eyes, and Vlad found that he could not move. Every muscle in his body answered to a will more powerful than his own. The haut rose above them, beautiful and merciless as the full moon, and Vlad’s heart filled with dread against his will; he knew with utter certainty that the game was over, and that there was now no escape. This was death. 

Then a roar split the skies, and the air around them burned with terrible heat. The _Naismith_ ’s massive plasma cannon fired, its beam striking the bubble’s surface squarely, the surface of the energy shield turning white as it absorbed the beam. Then it fired again, and again, and again, scorching even the air around them as it drove the haut back bit by bit.

Vlad staggered to his feet and slowly, painfully, dragged the unconscious Aral the rest of the way to the ship. “Beth!” he shouted.

She turned from the firing controls. Her face was frozen in a mask of pain from resisting the haut’s mental assault. But she left the controls and came to the door, grabbing Aral’s shoulders and pulling him into the safety of the ship.

Vlad moved to follow them, but as he door began to slide closed behind him, he heard a terrible shriek ring through the sky.

He turned around, and through the haze of the continuing plasma fire he saw the force-bubble soaring back out toward the ruins.

 

***

 

Fyodor pulled off the ring and fell to his knees. “What have I done?” he whispered.

He’d murdered a woman. And he hadn’t even needed to kill her. He could have commanded her to leave them in peace, he could have made her help them, he could have done any number of other things… He could have made her bring Sam back. He’d had a choice between the ring and Sam and he’d let Sam go. She was useless to the haut now, without the ring. They’d kill her, and he would have let them do it.

It was the right thing to do, he knew. Just as killing the haut had been the right thing to do. Sam’s death was Sam’s death; the ring falling into the hands of the haut was the extinction of humanity. But Fyodor felt suddenly very cold inside.

He could hear President Cordelia’s voice in his head, solemn and serious. _All this way it has sought, and is seeking, and will seek to manipulate you and your friends, and unless you are prepared for it, it will succeed._

“Fyodor!” He turned to see Padma running towards him, puffing loudly. “The haut,” he gasped. “I saw-” He caught sight of the body and skidded to a halt, his eyes wide as saucers.

“You’re too late,” said Fyodor. “Sam betrayed us. They took her away. I killed the haut-lady.”

“You did what?” said Padma, gazing down at the body with a wide-eyed, sickened look on his face.

“I killed her!” Fyodor repeated. “The ring made me do it, don’t you understand? The ring made Sam a thief and a traitor. The ring made them all fight with each other. It’s the ring. It’s the ring that’s been doing this to all of us. It’s been doing this all along. It was quiet on Beta, but now it’s working its power again.”

Padma looked from the body to Fyodor and the ring and back. “They’re still fighting back there,” he said slowly. “It _is_ the ring, isn’t it? I’ve never seen Vlad and Beth fight before.” He stepped back suddenly, looking at the ring with fear in his eyes. “Is it going to… do that to them, too? What if they end up killing each other?”

“It will, if it gets the chance,” Fyodor said bleakly.

“Then we need to get it away from them,” said Padma, with more seriousness than Fyodor had heard in his voice before.

Fyodor closed his eyes. “I must get away from here. But how? I cannot take the ship by myself.”

“Eat something and think about it,” advised Padma. He sat down on the haut’s empty float chair and began to wipe sweat from his brow.

“Padma!” shouted Fyodor. Padma jumped up with a sudden yelp. “What? Where?” he gasped, looking all around.

“No, you idiot!” Fyodor moved past him and sat down on the haut's float-chair. Its arms were studded with small jewel-like contacts arranged in patterns of swirling waves. Fyodor pressed the one closest to his hand, and the shimmering gray bubble snapped up around him. It was transparent from the inside.

A floating screen appeared in the air before his hand. Though he had learned something about handling a spaceship, Fyodor had no idea what the long lists of numbers meant. But he simply examined all the controls one by one, until he had brought up a list of pre-programmed routes.

_Eta Ceta._

Fyodor raised a finger and touched the screen. Slowly, the bubble began to rise into the air.

“Hang on!” said Padma, who had been watching the bubble all this time. “I’m coming too!”

Fyodor looked down to see the young Vor standing before him with folded arms. He collapsed the bubble. “No!”

“But I can’t stay here!” protested Padma. “There’s another haut around! Besides, I want to see Eta Ceta. I want to be there when you destroy the Enemy.”

“No,” said Fyodor. “It is my task. I was chosen, and I will go alone. It’s too dangerous.” _Besides, you’re an idiot_.

Padma tilted his head quizzically. “Oh, really? And what were you planning to eat on the way, if I may ask?”

Fyodor suddenly realized that there was no food in the bubble. Had the haut engineered themselves to the point where they absorbed energy from the air, like giant butter bugs?

“Typical hero,” muttered Padma, shaking his head. “Charging into danger, saving the universe, never bothers to think of the really important things.” He held up the box in his hand, just out of Fyodor’s reach. The butter bug poked its pointed head out from under the lid, its long green antennae quivering in the wind.

Padma gave Fyodor a winsome smile. “ _Now_ can I come?”

***

“I’m alive?” Aral whispered a few hours later.

“Evidently,” answered Vlad, looking up from his chair by the bedside. “It surprised me, too.”

Aral looked up at him, and then unwillingly lowered his eyes to the remains of his leg, covered in thick translucent regeneration film.

“We did everything your medical manual said,” Vlad explained. “It should grow back in a few weeks. Your galactic technology is astounding – on Barrayar, you would have ended up with a metal leg.”

“I see,” answered Aral weakly. “What happened to the haut?”

“I’m not sure,” said Elizabeth from the doorway. Aral looked up at her with a sudden smile, and she smiled back in obvious relief before continuing. “There were two of them on the planet. I think one died, and the one who was attacking us fled to her side.”

“Died?” Aral’s eyes abruptly opened wide. “A haut is dead? How?”

“Fyodor killed her, I think.” Elizabeth sounded as surprised as he did. “And now he’s gone, and so is Padma. I couldn’t sense them. And there’s something else.” She hesitated before rushing on. “I think Sam was in that bubble. Along with the haut.”

Aral’s eyes narrowed. “A prisoner?”

“I don’t think so.”

“Then she betrayed us,” Aral said quietly. “The haut must have tempted her. It’s happened before. She’s in for a bad shock.”

“Well,” said Vlad at last, “There’s no way we can possibly follow them now.”

Elizabeth nodded reluctantly. “Sergyar it must be, then.” She came across the room and squeezed Aral’s shoulder. He laid a hand over hers, smiling. “I'll be all right, cousin. No need to panic.”

She nodded. “Let him get some sleep, Vlad,” she urged, returning to the controls.

The two men sat for a while in silence after she had left. “You lunatic,” said Aral finally. “What you did back there was suicidal, you know that?”

“It isn't the Vor way to leave people behind.” Vlad answered. 

Aral nodded slowly. “No. You don't do that.” He paused. “About some of the things I said back there – they were undeserved, and I owe you an apology for them. I can’t remember ever being so angry before.”

“Neither can I,” said Vlad. “It all disappeared somehow, along with the haut.” He looked down. “And with the ring. Galeni was right, as usual. Perhaps Fyodor and Padma are better guardians for the ring than either of us.”

“Yes. You were right. About honor. When I said those things, I wasn’t thinking of myself. I was only thinking of Sergyar. I thought that you, trying to come back and reunite us all, would be a disaster. Now I think that maybe I was wrong.”

Vlad was silent for a long while. “I didn’t actually go back for you,” he said at last, trading confession for confession. “I went because I thought you were going to steal the ring from Fyodor. I have misjudged you all this time, and for that I owe you an apology.”

Aral looked away from him. “You don’t. I _was_ considering it – had been considering it all the way from Barrayar, in fact. When I ran for Fyodor and the others, I still hadn’t decided what I was going to do. I don’t know what I would have done if I’d found them.”

He took a deep breath and turned back to Vlad. “But I think - I think that if you'd been in my position, you wouldn't have taken the Great Seal for yourself. For all its influence, you would not have forsaken your oath.”

There was an awkward silence. Then slowly, Aral gestured down to the remnant of his leg. “Sorry,” he said. “Know I’m supposed to kneel and all that, but I don’t think I can manage that just now…”

“That’s all right,” said Vlad, coming forward to stand beside the bed. He held out his hands, palms cupped together.

The words of the liege-oath, at least, had not changed in five hundred years.


	9. The Two Planets

Vlad and Elizabeth stood together by the viewing port and looked out at Sergyar rising beneath them. At another time it might have been a lovely planet, covered with swirling patterns of blue and green and white clouds. At the moment the effect was spoiled by the seven massive orbital fortresses, and the three more that were still half-constructed and obviously being finished at a frenzied pace. Hundreds of ships of all shapes and sizes surrounded the planet, but even the mightiest moved aside to make way for the tiny _Naismith_ as it plunged headlong into the atmosphere.

“I’m sorry,” Elizabeth said in the silence. “I didn’t mean half of what I said to you on Escobar. I don’t know what got into me –” She broke off. “No. That’s not true. I do know. The ring was driving all of us that day. I was so angry at the time that I couldn’t see it, but when I look back now…” She gazed down at the floor. “If Fyodor had not taken the ring away when he did, I believe it would have gone on until sooner or later we all killed each other in anger. And I couldn’t have stopped it. I would have been worse than useless.”

“You're not useless,” Vlad said quietly. “Never. We would all have died on Escobar if you hadn't warned us the haut were coming. You just need time to get used to your new strength. You'll learn to fight the Cetagandans in time.”

“I'll try,” she murmured, sounding unconvinced. “I am trying. But…” she fell silent, and then the words spilled out in a rush. “But I still fear them, Vlad. Whenever I came near the ring, I felt this presence in my mind. I never dreamed that anything like that could exist. It was so twisted, so filled with hate. And to think _that_ is what drove the Cetagandans...”

Vlad took her hand. “I fear them too.”

Elizabeth looked at him, surprised. He would never have admitted that to anyone else. “You don’t show it.”

“That does not change the fact that I am afraid. We all are. After what we saw on Escobar, I think we would have to be inhuman to not be afraid.” He'd been seeing the scenes in his head since he saw the burned planet. Vorbarr Sultana razed to the ground, Barrayar in flames... he didn't have to be a telepath to know that she had seen them too.

“So,” he said, “you didn’t mean _half_ of what you said on Escobar…”

Elizabeth sighed. “I should have known you’d come back to that. Aral had a point. It’s been five hundred years since we ruled Sergyar. What you’re trying to do… I’m not sure it’s a good idea. Even if these Sergyaran Vorkosigans swear to you, do you think the people will accept you? Why would they? You don’t have the power to enforce your will.” She looked up at him. “Vlad, why are you so bent on Sergyar, really?”

They had entered the atmosphere, and both of them paused for a while to watch in awe as red-gold fire wreathed the ship. At last Vlad said: “Do you remember the make-believe games we played when we were children, Beth? How we used to play at the Glorious Return?”

“I remember,” she answered, smiling. “I would be the pilot who discovered the hidden wormhole.”

“And you’d fly me out to the galaxy,” said Vlad. “And we’d have all sorts of adventures. Did you ever imagine it would truly happen?”

Elizabeth laughed. “I never thought it was possible.”

“I believed it was possible,” said Vlad. “I always knew how much we had searched and failed; how low the chances of finding a wormhole were. But in my heart, I always believed, right from those days. I had planned that when I turned twenty, my first order would be to rebuild the fleet. As things turned out…” he spread his arms to encompass the viewscreen, the flaming alien sky, the planet beneath.

“It was my dream, Beth,” he whispered. “It still is my dream. To lead Barrayar out into the galaxy once more. To reunite the three worlds. To restore the Empire.”

At last she nodded, her hand tightening around his. “I understand. I’m still not sure I agree with you, but I understand.”

Vlad smiled, and this time his smile was genuine. “I’m glad to hear that. And I know it’s not going to be easy. That’s why I need you. I want you by my side, through all of it.”

She hesitated. “I will be there. You know that, Vlad.”

“That is not what I meant.” Vlad opened his mouth, then closed it and stared at her for a moment before suddenly bursting into a laugh. “But I’m making a fool of myself. You already know what I’m going to say, don’t you?”

He could see confirmation in her eyes. Never mind. He had been waiting to say this for years, he had dreamed of saying it since they were both children, and he would not give it up now just because she had gotten Betan chemical modifications from their twenty-times-great-grandmother and now she knew.

He stepped forward and took her other hand in his; then he raised both hands to his lips.

“Marry me,” he whispered.

“Vlad…” she began.

“Not now,” he assured her. “Later. When this is all over, and I have an Empire to lay at your feet. I would offer you a hundred worlds if I could, but three are all I have. Beth…”

He bent his head and kissed her, hesitantly at first, then passionately, one hand twisting in her fiery hair. After a moment, her arms encircled his neck, and she returned the kiss.

“Yes,” she breathed at last, as the _Naismith_ began to descend over Chaos Colony.

 

***

 

Aral had sent messages ahead of them, and there were Vorkosigan armsmen awaiting them at the spaceport. They helped their injured lord into a float-chair and escorted the small party to a waiting flyer, apparently unperturbed at the sight of the two blackbirds fluttering around Elizabeth’s head.

They passed over wide city streets being dug up as the city prepared for siege. Despite that, groups of people stood out in the open in many places, waving at the brown-and-silver flyer and cheering. Aral sat up and waved back with a genuine smile. Vlad tried to wave to the people who stopped to stare curiously at the two Barrayarans, but to his surprise it made him feel uncomfortable.

What did they think? Were they glad or sorry to be reunited with their mother planet? For the first time it struck him that they possibly did not care at all. If there was any planet save Sergyar in their mind, it was likely Escobar, not Barrayar.

Nor had he expected to be so awed by the city. Aral pointed out places of interest to him all along the way, but he could hardly keep track of them. The lightflyer had to swerve to avoid the glittering towers that seemed to stretch all the way into the clouds. There were so many levels of streets and walkways criss-crossing each other, and strange Sergyaran plants grew everywhere. At some places they flew over parks, and a succession of bizarre, brightly colored animals peered up at the flyer. To Vlad's very limited galactic experience the city seemed like a mixture of Beta Colony and Barrayar, one that had taken the best of both worlds.

The lightflyer descended onto an empty landing pad in the back of the Viceroy's Palace, where more liveried armsmen awaited them. One of the men held open the door for Vlad, but as he began to get out, Aral caught his arm.

“Look,” Aral whispered, “just let me handle this, all right?”

Vlad nodded his agreement and stepped out of the flyer. They left the landing pad and passed into a vast white courtyard dotted with fountains, a silver-leaved native Sergyaran tree growing in the center. At the far end, a woman in brown-and-silver livery stood by a pair of massive steel doors.

“Welcome back, my lord,” she said as they approached.

Aral smiled back. “Thank you, Armswoman. It's good to see you again.”

Still smiling, the woman collected knives and stunners from Vlad and Elizabeth before touching a contact on the wall. The great doors swung open with a soft hiss.

Vlad and Aral entered the Viceroy’s hall side by side, with Elizabeth a step behind. A hush fell over the great hall as they entered, and all around them men and women turned to watch.

Vlad glanced from side to side as they walked, taking it all in. It was sparsely but very elegantly decorated, the walls covered with intricate natural patterns that seemed to merge into the ornamental Sergyaran plants on the floor. He had expected to find something familiar here, but while he could recognize motifs similar to those of pre-isolation Barrayar, the entire style of the hall was alien to him. Several holographic displays had been set up around the room, and people clustered around them. One whole vast wall was spanned by a holographic map of Sergyaran space.

On a large chair at the far end of the room sat the Viceroy of Sergyar, Admiral Lord Mark Vorkosigan. The eighth Viceroy was tall and golden-haired like his son, and the resemblance between them was strong. Only Lord Mark's hair was flecked with gray, and the lines around his blue eyes were thick and worn. Like Aral and most of the people in the hall, he wore a green military uniform that looked almost, but not quite, Barrayaran.

Aral had spoken to Vlad of his father on the journey from Escobar, had described him in words of great love and honor. Vlad knew the Viceroy to be a strong war leader as well as an able ruler, one who had the love of his people and the respect of his parliament. Despite Aral's detailed explanations Vlad was still not sure he had fully understood how the Sergyaran parliament functioned. But he had understood that it came second. This man was the heart of Sergyar.

But now Vlad's eyes went straight from the Viceroy's chair to the raised dais on its right. The Viceroy's chair stood on the floor. On the highest step of the dais there sat a plain wooden camp stool, untouched and unoccupied.

The three came to a halt in the middle of the solemn hall. “Father,” said Aral, bowing in his float-chair.

The Viceroy rose from his seat and went straight to his son, kneeling before the float-chair to give Aral a tight, hard hug. “We all thought you were lost,” he whispered hoarsely. “Welcome back, son.”

There were tears in Aral’s eyes as he returned his father’s embrace. “Thank you, sir. It’s good to be home.”

Eventually the Viceroy released his son and rose to his feet. He turned slowly to Elizabeth. “And you must be our cousin from the other side of the wormhole,” he said, smiling broadly. Something in his face told Vlad that he had smiled very little in recent days. “You’re most welcome. Of course we would have been delighted to welcome you here at any time, but especially now. We have great need of you.”

Elizabeth smiled back at the Viceroy. Even Vlad found himself relaxing. It was hard not to return that open, friendly smile. “I’ll do whatever I can to help you and your people, my lord,” she said. “I swear it upon my word as Vorkosigan.”

“A word that I would not dream of doubting,” the Viceroy said, smiling still. Then he turned back to his son, “Now, since your message was as cryptic as all your messages are, tell me – what really happened on Barrayar?”

The hall was now absolutely silent, all the Sergyarans stopping to listen. Aral took a deep breath and slowly began to tell the tale, beginning with his discovery of the wormhole, his pursuit by the haut, his landing on Barrayar and the council at Vorkosigan Surleau. The Viceroy listened to all this in amazement and approval, occasionally stopping Aral to ask some question or offer praise.

But when Aral described the discovery of the Great Seal on Barrayar, Vlad saw the Viceroy's eyes narrow. He grew still as Aral described the Council and the journey to Beta and then Escobar. And when they reached the point at which the ring went on its way to Eta Ceta with the three Barrayarans, he could not contain his anger any longer.

“You held the Great Seal of the Star Crèche in your hands?” he burst out. “And you sent it on to _Eta Ceta_? Your home is about to be invaded, and you make the enemy a present of his greatest weapon? What were you thinking, boy? What idiot ordered this?”

Aral fell silent. “It was done by my order,” said Vlad quietly.

The Viceroy’s eyes settled on him at last. Vlad met them without blinking. “And you are…” said the Viceroy.

“Ah,” Aral began. “My lord Viceroy, Father, this is-”

Vlad stepped past him. “I am Vlad Vorbarra, son of Selig Vorbarra, descended in direct line from Gregor Vorbarra the Great,” he announced, his voice ringing across the silent hall. “Emperor of Barrayar, Komarr and Sergyar.”

No one spoke for a full minute. Aral slowly lowered his face to rest in his hands. The Viceroy’s face had gone dark. “What is this?” he demanded.

“It’s the truth,” admitted Aral.

“I am the Emperor, and I have returned to claim my throne. Your son has sworn oath to me, Viceroy.” said Vlad. “Will you do the same?”

The Viceroy turned to his son, shock in his eyes. “Is that true?”

“Yes, sir.” Aral looked up. “It’s not just me, Lady Cordelia said-”

“Lady Cordelia is no longer the Vicereine,” he said sharply. “You seem to be entirely ignorant of the fact that we are being _invaded_. Do you imagine that I have time to waste on this nonsense?” He turned angrily to face Vlad. “There is a Cetagandan force parked two wormholes away from my planet,” he said. “If you think that now, at this time, I will risk my people’s lives by putting them into the hands of an unknown and untrained boy from a barbarian planet, you are gravely mistaken.”

Aral swallowed. “Father,” he said quietly. “My lord Viceroy. You don’t understand. He wouldn't – father, you must listen. What you’re saying is treason.”

“Treason?” The Viceroy spun back to him, his face darkening with anger. “Treason is that you, my son and heir, swore oath to this pretender over me. You held in your hands the means for our people's survival, and you let two Barrayaran children deliver it right into the waiting arms of the haut Giaja? And you dare talk to me of treason?”

“I asked for it,” said Aral, his voice wavering for the first time. “My request was denied.”

“Then you should have taken it,” the Viceroy said coldly. “You should have taken it by any and all means necessary. You should have brought it to me.”

Vlad’s eyes flicked to Elizabeth. Her eyes were half-closed and fixed on the Viceroy. He stalled for time. “If you have problems with my decision, Viceroy, take them up with me. I am your Emperor. Will you acknowledge this, or will you break the oaths of your ancestors?” He gestured toward the empty camp stool.

“Five hundred years ago,” the Viceroy said, “one of your ancestors may have been Emperor to one of my ancestors. Sergyar has changed since then, it has grown and built and struggled for survival, it has fought wars and survived, all without your help. We do not need your help. We do not want your help. I will ask you this only once – will you give up this false claim of yours?”

Vlad glanced once around the watching faces, variously shocked, bewildered and angry. Not one voice was raised in his support. Elizabeth met his eyes silently. < _I cannot move him. We have no choice but to agree._ >

Vlad faced the Viceroy and met his eyes squarely. “I have made no claim that is false.”

The Viceroy looked furious. He did not even answer; he only motioned once to his armsmen at the back of the hall, and two of them began to move in Vlad’s direction. One put his hand to the weapon at his belt.

Vlad’s eyes narrowed. “Be warned, Viceroy,” he said softly, pointing once more at the camp stool. “I swear by my word as Vorbarra, the next time I enter this hall, it will be to take my rightful place.”

He spun around and stormed out of the doors before either of the guards had a chance to touch him.

 

***  


They caught up with him just outside the Palace gates. “Listen,” said Aral, bringing his float-chair to a halt in front of Vlad, “I’m sorry, I had no idea, I knew he’d be angry but I never expected this –” he paused and took a deep breath. “Look, he’s been through a lot, and now the Cetagandans are about to invade his planet, and on top of that you land up and tell him it isn’t his planet anymore, he’s obviously going to be upset. Give it some time; I can talk to him again-”

“No,” said Vlad. “I will not go back there. I gave my word and I will keep it, even if he will not.”

“Well, then, at least don’t be suicidal again.” Aral put a set of code-keys into Vlad’s hand. “If you’re going, take the _Naismith_. Otherwise the Cetagandans will pick you up five minutes out of the wormhole.”

Vlad looked down at the keys in surprise. “But - it belongs to you.”

Aral opened his hands. “Consider it Sergyar’s first instalment on five hundred years of unpaid Imperial taxes.”

Vlad managed a crooked smile. “Ah. That explains much.” He turned to Elizabeth. “Let’s go, then.”

She shook her head. “No.”

“No?” He paused. “Beth, we can't linger here, not after that.”

“How can you even think of leaving?” she demanded. “The Cetagandans are two wormholes away, Vlad, weren’t you _listening_? I can save lives here, I just caught a glimpse of the Viceroy's mind when he looked at me – he was so happy to have me, he _needs_ me - he’s basing his defensive strategy on having a telepath in the ranks! It’s bad enough that you’re running away from the battlefield, but you expect me to leave them when they need me to defend Sergyar? To abandon my family for your pride?”

Vlad stared. “Is that what you think this is?” he asked at last. “Desertion? What would you have had me do back there, Beth? Give in to a traitor? Renounce my throne?”

“How would it matter?” she replied in a fierce undertone. “You managed nineteen years without Sergyar. You could have managed the rest of your life. He was right, Vlad. These people don’t need a Barrayaran Emperor. You could have released their oaths and gained their friendship, but no. He was _right_ and you were behaving like a spoiled child. How could you not see that?”

Vlad stood very still, looking at her for a long time. “I had no choice but to do what I did,” he said slowly. “I _am_ the Emperor. I am sorry, Beth, but I cannot escape that.”

She took a deep breath, and then deliberately took a step back toward the palace. “I can. You can go back to the Viceroy and accept him as an equal, or fly off into space. But I won’t leave while they need me here.”

“Beth!” Vlad stepped forward and caught her hands in his own. “No. Absolutely not. I cannot leave you here - you must come. I request and require it.”

“You’re not twenty yet,” she retorted. “Come back in three months and use those words - if we're still alive to hear them.”

Stung, he replied, “You would send me into exile alone? After what you said to me before we landed? I thought, after that, that I could at least count on your loyalty.”

She looked like he had struck her. “How can you say - ” She stepped back suddenly. “I am loyal to you,” she whispered. “Will always be loyal to you. But I won’t leave these people, Vlad. Don’t ask me to.”

“I do ask it. I must.”

Elizabeth was silent for a moment, and Aral too, staring back and forth between her and Vlad with growing alarm in his eyes. Then Elizabeth turned around and walked back in the direction of the Palace.

She was halfway across the white courtyard when one of the blackbirds fluttered off her shoulder and flew back, to settle on Vlad’s arm. She halted for a second, and then went on without turning, past the gates and into the palace.

Vlad turned and found Aral watching him thoughtfully. “It’s not too late if you run after her right now,” he said. “Fall at her feet. Beg forgiveness. A kiss or two wouldn’t hurt.”

Vlad flushed and turned away. “Take care of her. For me.”

Aral nodded. “That I will, Sire.”

 

***  


Only after the _Naismith_ had escaped orbit did Vlad finally give in and bury his face in his hands. “Where am I supposed to _go_?”

“Ah,” said a soft voice behind him. “I think I may be able to help you with that.”

Vlad spun around, one hand automatically reaching for his weapon. Then he dropped it on the floor and leaped out of his seat at the sight of the familiar green-uniformed figure behind him. “General Galeni!”

To his own surprise, Vlad found himself hugging the old man tightly in sheer relief, seeing him so firm and solid and alive.

“Sire,” said Galeni softly.

“Oh, General,” answered Vlad in delight, releasing the old man at last. “I don’t know what you’re doing here or what’s going on, but I’ve never been happier to see you. Please, you've got to help me. She’s going to die - they’re all going to die, and there’s nothing I can do about it -”

“There is something you can do,” Galeni told him. “Listen closely, Sire. You must go to the planet of Dagoola IV. There you will find the help you need.”

“Dagoola IV,” repeated Vlad. “Very well. Ah, what exactly –” But Galeni was already fading away.

“I will go,” Vlad assured him. “I’ll save them all, General. I promise.”

Galeni suddenly stopped fading. “Young idiot,” he said in apparent exasperation. “How do you think you can save them? You are alone. You have one ship. You know virtually nothing of the universe beyond what you’ve read in a book that’s half a millennium old.”

“Have no fear,” said Vlad, trying to sound more confident than he was. “I’ll find a way.”

Galeni sighed. “Yes,” he said as he disappeared into the empty air. “That’s the worst part of it. You will.”


	10. The Siege of Sergyar

Elizabeth walked through the streets of Chaos Colony and watched as the city prepared for war. The great force-dome surrounding Chaos Colony and its outskirts was nearly complete. Men, women, even children were busy at work, building the dome, preparing weapons, stockpiling bug butter. But everywhere that Elizabeth went, people turned from their work to watch her.

She felt unspeakably discomfited, feeling every one of the hundreds of gazes turned upon her. They looked at her with awe, and worse, with hope; as if they expected her to save them. As if she could save them.

She would try.

Six months ago she would not have thought that. But already her old existence seemed a lifetime ago. She was no longer that girl who had been content to play mind-reading games with her cousins in Vorbarr Sultana. That girl had seen a chance to do something truly important, to make a difference for the first time in her life, and she'd taken it.

And then their fellowship had broken, so soon after they had set out. She wondered if she would ever see any of them again: Sam who was taken by the haut; Padma who was even now on his way to Eta Ceta with Fyodor, preparing to face even greater dangers than her. And Vlad - she cut that thought off before it could go further, and it was hard to do. Her mind grew stronger with every passing minute, faster than she could learn to control it. The hardest part now was managing _not_ to feel. Here, in the center of millions of people, it took all her skill to wall herself off from the waves of terror, despair, and resistance surging around her.

The Sergyaran fleets were still returning to their home planet one by one. Elizabeth could tell the news they brought by the rise and fall of the crowd’s emotions. Beta Colony was besieged; the Cetagandans had been met at Komarr. The fleet was falling back through wormhole after wormhole, and only the last jump to Sergyar was still defended. It was only a matter of time.

The last of the ships arrived late in the night, little more than a handful of survivors, exhausted and half-shattered. “So few,” Elizabeth heard the guards whisper when she returned to the Viceroy’s halls. “Sixty ships lost in two hours. And those that survived…”

She remained awake for many hours that night, looking out of the window at the grey air heavy with dust and foreboding. When she slept at last her sleep was uneasy and disturbed. It seemed only moments later that she was roused by a surge of fear that threatened to overwhelm her unguarded mind.

A Vorkosigan armswoman stood over her bed with a light, her entire body taut with tension. “The Viceroy has summoned you,” she said. “It’s time. The Cetagandans are here.”

  
***

 

The Cetagandan mother ship matched the entire Sergyaran fleet in size. Tens of thousands of small fighters, black and spherical, surrounded it like a swarm of flies, engaging the Sergyaran ships. Thousands upon thousands of energy beams clashed with each other in space, and ships exploded in flames all around.

The Sergyarans fought viciously for every station and every asteroid, but they were outmatched by the enemy's sheer numbers. And yet it seemed as if the Sergyaran ships knew when and from where the next attack would come. Time and again, they changed formation, or broke and scattered, a bare instant before the enemy struck.

Elizabeth sat in the Viceroy's hall with the Sergyaran tacticians, connected to the fleet above. But her mind was far above, darting around the battle. One moment she was watching the Cetagandan pilots, the next, she was watching the tactics room of the Cetagandan ship. She flicked through alien minds like a player at cards, discarding the carefully molded minds of Ba as she found the stronger, freer minds of the Ghem-officers who controlled them.

For twenty-four hours she tested the limits of her mind. She was no haut Cordelia Vorkosigan to defend her planet's space by sheer will alone, but again and again she warned the Sergyarans before the Cetagandan ship released a cloud of missiles, and the fleet scattered and escaped. She found the weak points in the Cetagandan defences and guided the defenders to them again and again, until the Cetagandan ship was trailing flames and smoke from a hundred gaping wounds, each of its attacks weaker than before. Still it came on.

But in doing so it came within range of the orbital fortresses, and now at the Viceroy’s command they blazed forth in an awe-inspiring display of firepower. The cloud of missiles stopped the Cetagandan ship for a time, and in that time the remnants of the fleet regrouped and drove it back.

But after their initial defeat the Cetagandans counterattacked. Elizabeth fought as hard as she could, but all she could do was delay them. To do what the haut did - to reach out and stop them, slow them, fill them with fear, destroy them - that was still too much for her, however hard she tried.

On the screen before them, a Cetagandan fighter plummeted into one of the already battered orbital fortresses. Nothing happened for an instant; then it exploded in a hundred kilometer-wide fireball, taking with it the six thousand men and women who lived inside. The pain and fear and despair of six thousand human minds hit Elizabeth's open mind in a single instant, and she was too exhausted to keep them away.

The stars whirled around her for a dizzying moment before darkness fell. The last thing she heard was the Viceroy's voice calling for a medic.

 

***

 

“I'm sorry,” Elizabeth said, hours later when she was able to speak again. The disappointment of the men and women around her was a knife-sharp pain in her mind, though not one of them had said a word. They had been too busy. The Cetagandans had taken out the orbital fortresses after several hours of pitched battle, and then seemingly amused themselves by picking off the remaining Sergyaran ships one by one with their gravitic weapons.

“Enough,” said the Viceroy, looking at her from the window. “You have done all you could.”

Lady Cordelia could have stopped them, she thought. Lady Cordelia could have held them off. But Lady Cordelia's last message to Sergyar had been that she was fighting her own war, and Elizabeth hadn't been good enough.

On the other side of the room, Admiral Vorsoisson looked down at the reports scrolling on his screen. “My lord Viceroy,” he said tonelessly, “sensors report that a second battle fleet has emerged from Cetagandan territory. It is expected to reach Sergyar in thirty-six hours.”

The Viceroy showed no indication of having heard him. He stood still as a statue, stern and silent as he gazed out of the force-shielded window. His eyes turned skyward to the searing flashes and streaks of color that lit the sky, as if he might from them discern the progress of the battle. “Activate the force-dome,” he said at last. “The city is to prepare for a siege. Thank you, officers. Our work is over.”

One by one they stood up and filed out of the room with bowed heads, until only Elizabeth was left, too tired to move. She heard the Viceroy move behind her chair; heard the clink of glass and a splash of liquid. “Here,” he said, bringing a glass to her lips. “Drink this. It'll help.”

Elizabeth sipped the liquid and slowly, awareness returned. Whatever substance was in the drink was good at clearing her brain. But the Viceroy and his officers had been on stimulants for over forty-eight hours now. She had slept to conserve her strength, and it hadn't been enough.

“Cordelia,” said the Viceroy unexpectedly, his voice low and strained, “once told me that in the Great War, the Enemy’s mind was everywhere. He saw everything. He moved everything. This time you sense nothing from him. He is distracted. By what, I wonder?”

Elizabeth put down the glass and turned to look at the Viceroy. “Then he does not yet have the ring,” she reasoned. “Fyodor and Padma must be safe. There is a chance yet.”

“Not for Sergyar,” he answered harshly. “It is too late for us. If only you had brought the ring to me!”

Elizabeth had expected this, and had her answer ready. “Of all who saw the ring,” she told him, “I was the only one who could see it for what it truly was. It is evil, and cruel, and powerful beyond any man. I was the one who told my father that we must destroy it. Had your son given it into your hand, my lord Viceroy, it would have crushed your mind. Your people would have held off the enemy outside only to find themselves helpless against the enemy within.”

His eyes narrowed. “I do not believe there exists an object that could make me a danger to my own people. But even if there were, I would not have been such a fool as to deliver it straight into the Enemy’s waiting hands. No, there is no doubt of it; my son’s folly has sealed the deaths of our people.”

“Have some hope,” she urged him. “Remember the prophecy.”

“A children’s tale,” he scoffed. “Cordelia used to read it to Aral when he was little and she visited us. I wish now that she had not. It is nothing more.”

“Galeni believed it,” Elizabeth countered, not expecting that it would help. To her father Galeni’s word had been unshakeable. What weight could it carry with this Sergyaran who had never met him?

“He believed that an unknown boy from the Dendarii mountains will prove to be the fabled Chosen One who will bring down the Enemy?” said the Viceroy. “And do you believe it too?”

“I think it is the only chance we have,” she admitted. “If we must all die in any case, what harm is there in risking it? It may prove to be true. Fyodor may succeed somehow. And I trust Galeni.”

He sighed. “Elizabeth, Elizabeth. . . don’t you see it?”

She blinked. “See what?”

He looked at her with a pitying expression. “You say this ringbearer of yours may yet destroy the enemy. How?”

“I don’t know, but -”

“I do,” he said. “There is one and only one power in this universe strong enough to bring down the Enemy, and that is the full power of the Ring. If your ringbearer is to defeat him, he must wield the Ring himself, and bring Giaja and all the legions of Cetaganda under his command. And then… you yourself have told me what must happen then. Would you swear fealty to the Celestial Lord Fyodor Csurik?”

She was speechless. “This Duv Galeni, I judge from your description, has been the power behind the Barrayaran Imperium for as long as anybody remembers. He saw his chance to do the same on a grander scale, and he took it. He intended to make this untrained boy the new Celestial Lord, and to sit behind him pulling the strings. And now he is dead, and you still stake the lives of all humanity on his failed lies.”

“No!” she denied furiously. “That’s – that’s not true!”

He shook his head. “I don't blame you, child. Barrayarans have been isolated for so long that you still believe in legends and myths and prophecies. There are no such things. I can understand how you were taken in. It only baffles me how my son could have been fooled by such a trick. If only he had brought the ring to me!”

Elizabeth sat silently as the Viceroy paced across the room. At last he gave her the barest hint of a smile. “Never mind!” he said. “Why argue among ourselves now, when our true enemy is right at our gates?” He turned his eyes again to the window. “There is still something we can do. We can let loose our last reserves and take out what remain of the enemy’s weapons; at least render them incapable of an orbital bombardment. We can force them to fight on land. Make them pay in their own blood for every Sergyaran life. We may buy ourselves a few days, perhaps a week.”

Elizabeth caught her breath, looking at his stubborn, unyielding expression, at the harsh lines etched into his proud face. She understood why his people spoke his name with love. It was the Vorkosigan charisma in all its strength, a power no less strong than telepathy in its own way. He reminded her of her own father, who had it too, and she wondered for a moment if she would ever see him again.

“My lord,” she began uncertainly as he moved to leave the room, “you could use your reserves to cut a way out. The losses would be great, but a few might still escape…”

He looked back at her and laughed suddenly, a rich and powerful laugh that filled the room. It was the first time she had heard him laugh. “You too?” he asked. “I've heard nothing else all day. But you are right in one thing - it is time for me to go up with the fleet. I was a soldier once, and I have not forgotten how to lead men into battle. From the front.”

He came to her then, and kissed her gently on the forehead. Then he turned away, and the great doors slid closed behind him.

Elizabeth remained in her seat, listening to the thunder in the sky. After a few hours, she went to the window. Beyond the opalescent dome the sky was filled with blazing streaks spreading out in an umbrella over the surface of the planet, the contrails of assault shuttles descending all over Sergyar.

Then the sun was blotted out and the sky grew dark. Scorched and battered, with smoke pouring through gaping holes in its hull, the colossal Cetagandan mother ship began to descend over Chaos Colony.  


***

 

A grim-faced armsman entered the hospital room where the patient lay alone, his newly regenerated leg still swathed in bandages.

“Viceroy Vorkosigan, sir?”

 

***

 

Elizabeth found Aral in the middle of the night, kneeling on the ground in the Palace gardens with an earthen bowl before him. A thin plume of dark smoke was rising into the air. For some reason the sight of the death-offering made her strangely glad, that some things at least had not changed with centuries of separation.

What worried her was the despair hanging over him like a cloud. He had barely spoken since Vlad had left. That still hurt; Vlad had left. Vlad wouldn’t be here beside them when the time came.

She saw Aral’s spine stiffening as she came closer, could almost see tension growing around him. Kneeling down by his side, she took the knife from his unresisting hand. She carefully cut off a lock of her own hair and put it in the bowl along with his. They stayed there in silence, watching the fire consume the offering; the flame flickered red and gold in the darkness, leaving nothing but a fine gray ash.

“It’s not your fault, Aral,” she said.

“The last thing he said to me was that I was a traitor,” Aral answered, his voice low and bitter. “And the last thing I said to him was that he was a traitor.” He looked up at her. “I wish you’d left while there was time. You did so much for us. We could at least have gotten you out while we could.”

Stung, she drew back. “You, too?”

“The Emperor told me to take care of you. I haven’t done a terribly good job of it. And I don’t want you to be hurt, either.”

“I am not a coward,” she retorted. “I can still be useful in the battle to come.”

He looked down. “What battle?” he asked. “What’s the point? What's the point of anything, now?”

His tone was flat, dead, and that frightened Elizabeth more than anything else. She caught his hand in hers, forcing him to meet her eyes. “You can't say that,” she whispered. “You can't. They need you, Aral. They loved your father. They fought on when there was no hope, because they knew he expected it of them. If you don't give them another symbol to fight for, they will not.”

She could hear his breathing in the darkness, harsh and ragged. “Why should they?” he said. “Oh, Elizabeth. Don’t you understand? We can’t win. We can’t make peace. We can't even surrender and hope for mercy. We’re not human to them. We’re vermin, filth to be exterminated. They can't live in the same universe as us. If we fight off this attack, their reinforcements will get us. If that fails, they’ll just send more.” He looked out to the smoke rising in the distance from where the Cetagandans had landed. “Why aren’t they pressing the attack? I wish they would just get it over with. Why do they have to play with us?”

“I don’t think they’re playing,” she said, and as she spoke she could sense the heavy cloud of anticipation that hung over the Cetagandan horde. “They seem to be waiting for something. The daylight, perhaps?”

“Ba can see in infrared,” he told her glumly.

Elizabeth studied his profile in the dim light. She couldn't read anything in his expression except for pain and despair; his mind was no better. She could soothe him, she thought suddenly. She could make him go out there and fight, make it happen so subtly he wouldn't even know. She felt the power ready in her grasp.

And then she let it go, for it would be wrong. He deserved better than that. That was the way of the haut, but she was Vor.

“Maybe we can't win,” she admitted. “But we can make them pay.” She hesitated. “Galeni once told me that the real measure of a man is how he chooses to face death. We can lower the dome and let the Cetagandans come for us in the morning – or we can fight. We can make a last stand that they’ll never forget.” She smiled suddenly, fiercely. “We are Vor, after all. More than Vor; Vorkosigan.”

“That’s true,” he said, very quietly.

Elizabeth let some small comfort go to his mind, not manipulating, only offering help. She felt his assent, and let him hold her hand while she gave him strength.

“Your Galeni was a clever man, I think,” said Aral at last. “I liked him. There were times when I just couldn't understand what was going on in his head, but he was smart, and brave, and nothing seemed to frighten him. Vlad was the same, only I could tell that Vlad was acting. Galeni really didn't feel fear.”

Elizabeth nodded. “The General – believed that he was protected. By higher powers.”

Aral smiled. “I can understand the temptation of that, at this moment. When nothing else is left... if there are powers higher than man, we could certainly use their help right now.”

A feather-light touch brushed Elizabeth's face. Startled, she looked up and saw the blackbird from Escobar flying over them.

Aral made a small quizzical noise as she rose to her feet and followed the bird. But he got up and came after her. The blackbird led them out to the edge of the city, where the force-dome glittered in the air before them. It circled round and round in the air, chirruping.

“Aral,” said Elizabeth. “Open it.”

He looked up in surprise. “Are you serious?”

She reached out with her mind and let him sense just how serious she was. With a puzzled look, he drew out the Viceregal Seal hanging from its chain around his neck and held it to the dome's surface. Slowly, as if it were reluctant to take the risk, a small section of the dome faded into nothingness. The bird shot out like an arrow. The two Vorkosigans followed it, stumbling as they ran to keep the bird in sight.

They ended up down on the banks of the river Rosemont. Elizabeth stared, sickened. The Cetagandans had been at work. The mighty river she’d seen from the sky when descending had slowed to a thin black trickle. Heavy fumes rose from the poisoned water, assailing her eyes and nose.

Suddenly something round and bright and shining shot out at them from behind a rock, shooting straight at Aral's face. He stumbled back and fell over, landing on his back with dark tentacles grabbing at his face.

Without even thinking, Elizabeth reached out with her mind for the bloodthirsty balloon's brain. It was a simple animal's mind, little more than a bundle of sensory systems and reflexes.

It worked; the balloon halted in mid-air. Elizabeth caught her breath in surprise. It was the first time she had tried to tame an animal since her new powers had come into their fullest strength; the creature's brain was so simple and clear, it took hardly any effort to hold it.

The balloon bobbed harmlessly up and down before Aral's face. Aral's eyes were glued to it, watching its iridescent surface with horrified fascination. At last he turned from it and looked at Elizabeth.

“You’re… not thinking what I’m thinking. Right?”


	11. The Muster of Dagoola

_How could I have died and gone to hell without noticing the transition?_

Vlad looked up from the memoirs and out over the surface of Dagoola IV. Miles Vorkosigan had referred only to the Cetagandan prison camp that had once existed here; now the description could well apply to the whole wretched planet.

From the little information he had been able to glean from the ship’s database, he knew it had been habitable once; indeed, it had been the site of a massive Cetagandan military base. The alliance had captured it at great cost in one of their first offensives, and the Cetagandans had not bothered to take it back. Instead they had launched a weapon that had turned the entire surface of the planet into a radioactive wasteland, killing every creature that lived there – or that might ever have lived.

Vlad had been in orbit for four days now, running sensor scans of the surface in the hope of finding some island where life might have survived. So far - he paused over his monitors – he had found nothing.

He made himself a sandwich from the ship’s meager stores and tore off a few pieces of bread for the bird. It flew off his shoulder and pecked hungrily at the scraps.

“Hungry?” Vlad asked it gently. “Me too.”

He had never realized how used he was to having people around him, guards at least. On his first day of being truly, absolutely alone, he had glanced up every five minutes, expecting to see his cousins, or even his armsmen or ImpSec. On the second day he had called aloud for Galeni ten times, twice making it an Imperial order, but even that had failed. On the third day he had given up and started talking to the bird. By now he was convinced that it talked back.

Though he had tried to avoid thinking about it, Vlad couldn't ignore his dwindling stores any longer. If he found nothing tomorrow, he would have to decide whether to turn around and search for a planet where he might find food, or stay here and risk running out. In either case, Sergyar would fall, and there would be nothing he could do to prevent it.

And if he turned around, where could he go? Sergyar was closed to him now, and the rest of the planets in this sector were either Cetagandan, surrounded by Cetagandans, or destroyed by Cetagandans. If he turned back to Barrayar, would there be anything left of it by the time he arrived? Vlad trusted General Galeni, and yet he couldn’t think of a single reason why the old man might have sent him here.

Elizabeth’s voice rang in his head as he closed his eyes. _There is nothing you can give them._ She had been right, he thought, and he'd lost her for nothing. But he was too proud to go back and admit it before the Sergyarans. Useless. At least he should have stayed to die with them.

This would be his legacy, then. If anyone survived, they’d call him Vlad the Coward. He couldn’t be with Sergyar in this time of crisis. He couldn’t be with Barrayar. He couldn’t go to Eta Ceta to destroy the ring. What had he come on this quest for in the first place? What had he really thought he could achieve?

A sharp peck on his nose disturbed his thoughts. Vlad’s eyes flew open to meet the blackbird’s beady eyes looking at him with stern disapproval. It dipped its beak and pecked again.

Vlad burst out laughing. Rubbing his nose, he picked up the bird and put it firmly on his arm, brushing crumbs off his clothes and the bird’s newly growing feathers. Its sharp eyes fixed him with a half-mischievous scrutiny that reminded him of Beth and made his heart ache even more. “Do you think she’s all right?” he whispered, stroking one dark wing as they went back to the pilot’s cabin.

The bird nipped at his hand. Strangely enough, Vlad felt reassured.

He paused before the monitors. Nothing, as usual; if anything, this mountainous, cave-ridden part of the planet was even more radioactive than the rest. He had just begun to turn away when the blackbird began to chirp loudly.

"What?” asked Vlad, looking down in surprise. The bird chirped again and fluttered off Vlad’s arm to perch on top of the screen.

It took Vlad several minutes to understand what the sensors were telling him. Even then, he ran three more scans before he was sure. The caves beneath the mountain's surface were no caves - they were a city.  


***

 

It was early morning when Vlad brought the _Naismith_ down at the base of the mountain. He stripped off his clothes and climbed into the snug protective suit, checking it carefully before stepping out onto the radioactive surface.

He had already located the path half-hidden between the stones at the mountain’s edge. A grey mist settled over him as he followed the narrow spiraling track, so thick that he had to keep one hand on the mountain wall to feel his way. Every few minutes, a monstrous shapeless form would loom out of the mist, a burnt-out lump that had once been a native tree. A strange dread seemed to fall over him as he passed between the lines of ancient stones, not unlike the fear that the haut-ladies used to still their victims.

Vlad wondered why he was bothering to do this. It was impossible that anyone could still be alive in that underground city. Inside the heart of the mountain, a human being might survive the radiation for a day, even a week. Not for a lifetime. Would he find nothing but a civilization of ghosts? He shivered as another line came back to him. _I will break the doors of hell, and bring up the dead . . ._

The path came to an end against the mountainside, blocked by a sheer wall of black stone, shadowed by the gloom of dark and ancient tree-stumps. The dark door loomed out of the fog like the mouth of night, and Vlad’s blood ran cold.

 _I have never believed in ghosts,_ he told himself, and he forced his trembling fingers to run along the edges of the rock, feeling for some crevice, some lever to move it. He felt no lever but signs carved in the rock above his head, covered by centuries of dust. He brushed off the dust with his gloved hands and stepped back, trying to control his runaway heartbeat as he peered through the mist at the eroded words. What ancient curse would guard these doors?

 

_**Forward Momentum** _

 

Something hard hit him on the back of his head, and he crumpled to the ground.

Vlad awoke some minutes later, trying to shake away the kaleidoscopic patterns dancing in front of his eyes. “Wh.. wh…” He blinked a few times, and the world began to come into focus again. “who…. aargh!”

He scuttled away from the face that loomed over him. The creature smiled, or at least it opened its mouth to display two rows of gleaming knife-sharp fangs. Vlad had barely moved a few inches when two more of the creatures appeared behind him. Before he knew it, he was surrounded.

Whatever they were, they weren’t human. Each one was close to eight feet tall, heavily muscled, with claws like butchers’ knives. And underneath their grey and white clothes, Vlad could see that they were covered with dark fur.

 _Monsters_ , thought Vlad helplessly, glancing around at his grinning captors. _Monsters with charged energy weapons._ Ghosts would have been better. He had always believed in monsters.

There was a loud cry from behind. Another of the monsters was standing at the foot of the path – no, jumping up and down at the foot of the path, waving his arms and shouting, pointing in the direction from which Vlad had come. Vlad caught the word _Naismith_ and realized that they must have found the ship.

The monster with the plasma rifle was listening with a thoughtful expression. Then he turned to Vlad and said in perfect English, “Are you the One?”

Vlad blinked in surprise. “Am I the what?”

“Are you the One?” repeated his captor.

“Which one?” asked Vlad.

They hit him again.

When Vlad woke once more, he was lying flat on his back on a metallic floor. Very slowly, he raised his head and looked around him.

The situation was not good. Armed monsters lined the walls in every direction. Monitors and comconsoles filled the remaining space, several of them displaying surveillance images of the planet’s surface. More monsters in grey and white were seated before them, but even their eyes were fixed on Vlad.

Another monster was seated in the upholstered command chair in the center of the room. It wore the same grey-and-whites as the rest, only with more decoration and gold braid. It watched Vlad through narrowed yellow eyes, hard predatory eyes that examined Vlad with the air of a wolf stalking its breakfast.

“Who are you?” Vlad managed to squeak. “ _What_ are you?”

A low rumbling growl ran around the room. “We are the Dendarii,” answered the creature. “The question is: who are you?”

It rose from its seat and stalked slowly toward Vlad. “A human being, here, after so many years,” it whispered. “We had almost forgotten what your kind looked like.” It suddenly extended one paw and sharp claws flicked out, stopping a bare millimeter from Vlad’s throat. Vlad shrank back.

“But by Taura the Mighty, we have not forgotten how to deal with spies of the Enemy!” the monster leaned close to Vlad’s face. “Who sent you here, little human?” it hissed. “How did you find us?”

A woman’s voice rang out behind him. “Leave him alone, Quinn!”

Vlad turned his head very, very carefully. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw one enormous monster stepping out from the pack. The rest moved aside automatically to clear a path for it. Vlad gulped.

It- no, she, it was unquestionably a she- was a good eight feet tall and the only one in the room not clad in grey and white. Powerful muscles rippled beneath her long trailing robes of shocking pink as she stalked towards them, her cat-like green eyes fixed upon his face. She bore no weapons, but one look at her hands convinced Vlad that she could tear him to pieces at any moment she chose.

The monster retracted his claws with a snap as the rest of the Dendarii in the room bowed their heads and fell silent. Vlad breathed again. “Suegar,” growled the clawed creature.

Her eyes fixed him with blazing anger. “How dare you threaten him, Quinn?” she demanded. “How dare you bring him here and not call me at once?”

“This is no time for your games, Suegar,” hissed Quinn. “This is an enemy spy, not your imaginary One.”

“You have command in all other matters, Acting-admiral Quinn, but the Special Orders are my territory." she snapped. "I will decide whether this is the One or not, and I will inform you of my decision in my own time. Now leave us.”

The Dendarii obediently began to file out of the room, but some, including Quinn, remained behind. “You go too far, Suegar,” he growled.

Her hand moved so fast Vlad didn’t even see the blow, but Quinn was on the floor with a cracked fang and blood seeping out from the corners of his mouth. “You do not go far enough,” she answered. “Out!”

The room cleared so quickly it might have been on fire, and Vlad was left alone on the floor staring up at a giant furry fanged female monster who wanted to eat him all by herself.

She hauled him to his feet with one enormous hand. “Come with me.”

 _To breakfast?_ he wondered wildly. But she led him away from the command center, through winding tunnels that opened into vast caverns.

The underground city extended much further than Vlad had realized from his scans. Vlad couldn’t stop staring around them as they passed through caves full of supplies and strange machines. There were even what seemed to be armories, full of weapons, machines, things he couldn't begin to recognize. Vlad guessed that they were moving toward the very center of the city. At last she pushed open an enormous door, and Vlad followed her through.

He stopped dead on the other side. They had reached the center; they stood now at the edge of a cavern that stretched down below them and around as far as Vlad could see. Vlad thought the whole Imperial Residence would fit comfortably in a corner.

Far below them, the floor of the cavern was dotted with great cylinders of gray and white metal, each of which could have comfortably housed a thousand men. _Spaceships_ , Vlad realized. There was an entire fleet here. Why were they here? How had they gotten underground?

But as he looked closer, he realized that these spaceships were of a strange sort, not like the Sergyaran or Betan ships or the old pictures he had seen in books. Their entire shape and structure was different, and the drive system at their backs was nothing like the standard Necklin drive. If anything, they resembled the old Cetagandan hulks he had seen floating in the nebula. But unlike those blasted shells, these ships had been carefully, even lovingly, maintained, like precious pre-isolation relics in the Imperial Museum.

Ships. Weapons. And soldiers. Dagoola was hiding an army. Vlad clenched his fists, nails digging into his palms as he began to realize why he was here. He could save Sergyar with this fleet, if only he could persuade these creatures to help. But why would they help? Why would they come for Sergyar?

At last Suegar opened a door into what was evidently a private chamber. Judging from the amount of pink in the room, Vlad guessed that it was hers. She sat down on a flowery pink armchair and motioned Vlad to sit opposite her.

On the table between them lay a heavy book bound in plain white, an actual wood-pulp paper book with pages you could turn. The sight of it made Vlad long desperately for home.

She sat in silence, waiting almost respectfully for him to speak. “So,” Vlad managed at last. “Um. Why aren’t you killing me?”

She tilted her head. “Do you not know?”

 _I know nothing around here_ , Vlad was about to say, but somehow, without any conscious will on his part, the words that came to his lips were Galeni’s.

“There’s a prophecy,” he said. "There's always a prophecy."

Suegar’s eyes widened. “Then you do know.”

She lifted the book reverently from the table. Turning the pages, she began to read aloud:

_Once, so our ancestors have taught us, the Dendarii fought the forces of the Enemy through fire and darkness and rivers of blood. On their shoulders was placed the hope and burden of humanity’s survival. Time and again they met the Ba in open battle and won.  
_ _Yet when the final battle came the Dendarii fled in terror before the power of the Celestial Lord, leaving a lone human woman to face the Enemy. And she succeeded where the bravest of the Dendarii feared to approach.  
_ _Those who remained could not face the eyes of the galaxy. Their shame drove them to hide in secret places, leaving home and friends behind, taking nothing but their ships and weapons and the tissue cultures from which their children would be born.  
_ _We who are the children of the disgraced: we will hide ourselves from the eyes of men and the creatures of the Enemy alike. Yet the One will find us. The One will come alone through the mists from another world, when times are most dire, and his return will herald the downfall of the Enemy. The One will unite the forces of the Dendarii and lead them to victory, as he did before.  
_ _Then, and only then, will the days of our glory be restored._

Vlad listened to the recital with his mouth hanging open. She snapped the book shut. “So wrote the Third Suegar in the Book of Special Orders," she said. "And so our people believed as they waited faithfully for the Second Coming. But years passed and the One did not come. Times changed, and now our command is full of those like Acting-admiral Quinn, to whom the teachings of the Suegars are nothing but children’s tales. "

She put the book down. "And now you come to us from another world, as the prophecy foretold, just when we are most in need of unity.” She leaned forward and looked directly at Vlad with a terrifying intensity in her gaze. “I am the twenty-fifth Suegar,” she said, her voice a soft growl. “Tell me, little human: who are you?”

Vlad swallowed and stared and suddenly, he understood. Looking at the thing - the woman - before him, he knew who her people were. And he could guess who they awaited, and why.

The means to save his people suddenly opened before him. Where he had seen no hope at all he now discerned a faint but clear light. But it was absurd, so obviously and completely absurd…

 _What on Kyril island am I doing?_ he thought.

But what else could he do?

He looked up and smiled at Suegar. “I am the One,” he answered, “and my name is Admiral Naismith.”

Suegar smiled back at him; it was a terrifying sight. Then she stood up and came around the table to stand before him, so close that they were almost touching. She bent down and cupped Vlad’s chin in one large hand, tilting back his head so that he was forced to meet her blazing eyes.

“Prove it,” she whispered.

Vlad stared up at her, his eyes suddenly as wide as saucers.

“Ulp,” he said.

 

***  


Kissing a woman with fangs was terrifying, but Vlad somehow found the trick of it. Being kissed back by a woman who had twice his weight and ten times his strength… that was harder to get used to. But the real Naismith would not have been afraid, and Vlad knew what he had to do.

Guilt, now, that was a greater problem. But with the stakes as high as they were? _And she chose not to follow me._

To his surprise, he found himself enjoying himself despite of his fear of being crushed. She had… beauty of a sort, not by any normal human standard, but Vlad soon discovered that sheer raw power had a beauty all of its own, and each one of her fingers were objects of pure and concentrated power, restrained only by will.

When they were finished at last, she smiled at him, and her smile was beautiful.

“Admiral,” she breathed. “I’ve waited so long…”

 _I am Naismith_ , Vlad reminded himself, looking at her shining eyes. _I must be Naismith._ He tilted his head and kissed her again, successfully navigating the fangs. “No longer.”

He ran a hand up her arm; strongly muscled, the skin beneath his fingers supple and firm as steel. “Natural armor,” she murmured. “Nodules of bone under the skin. Don't stop.”

“And these?” he asked, his hand running over her shoulder to trace one of the two long ridges that ran down her back. She made a small sound of pleasure, and he did it again. “Nothing,” she said finally. “Our ancestors were engineering us to be the next generation of soldiers; some of their experiments were incomplete. We know very little. Most of the ones who fled the Great War died of brain damage, insanity, all from that last battle with the Enemy. We are descended from the children who survived.”

A sudden image came to Vlad, and he drew back his hand: the painting on Beta Colony, the third figure flying from the scene of battle. That figure had borne a remarkable resemblance to Suegar, except that it had been winged; had that been artistic license, indicating flight from the battlefield? He traced his hand along her body more thoughtfully this time. “Was it that bad? Facing the Enemy in battle?”

Suegar looked suddenly frightened, as if Vlad was asking her to talk about her deepest nightmares. “Our stories say that... that there are no words to describe it. Our ancestors fought the Ba and the ghem and even the haut, and they won. But when the Enemy came to battle, he broke their minds. They fled from him. They - deserted in the heat.”

 _Oh._ “I'm sorry,” Vlad whispered. “But you'll get your vengeance on the Enemy when we meet his forces at Sergyar. You will have your honor back.”

Her eyes blazed up in fierce delight. “Yes,” she said. “Quinn doesn't care about the past. He would have us hide here until the end of the universe. But we are no ordinary soldiers. We are the _Dendarii_. We were built to fight. And now we will fight again.” She got out of the bed and wrapped a pink robe around herself with brisk, powerful movements, still smiling fiercely. “It is time to announce your coming to the people, Admiral,” she told him. “Let them live as they should once again.”

“Let them prepare for battle,” Vlad told her, getting to his feet. He should by all rights have been exhausted, but he felt as light as a feather, heady, almost drunk with his success. But there was no time for celebration. Sergyar was likely under attack already. He spared a moment to glance down at the radiation counter on his wrist. It was not at dangerous levels yet, for Suegar’s chamber was in the very heart of the Dendarii city. Nevertheless he picked up his suit from where it lay crumpled on the ground. The Emperor could hardly afford to take chances with radiation. Though they weren't isolated anymore, they would have galactic technology again if they survived long enough, gene-scanning and replicators and… and whatever else had been developed in five hundred years, and why was he thinking of these things now?

He needed to assume command as fast as possible. He would need to convince all the Dendarii of his act. And then get them to Sergyar, and then... Vlad wasn't quite sure what he would do then. He'd fought in self-defence, but he'd never commanded any fighting force, let alone a space fleet of super-soldiers. “Tell them the Admiral wishes to address them,” he ordered. “It’s time for Quinn and the others to see the truth.”

He'd just have to make it up as he went along, as the real Naismith had done. He turned around, and went down in a heap as the paralyzing field caught his legs.

“Oh,” said Quinn from the door, “we do.”

“Quinn!” shrieked Suegar. “You mutinous - he’s the _Admiral_!”

Quinn turned his weapon to point at her. “I’ve taken enough of your insubordination, Suegar," he said, his voice quiet and deadly. "Come with us. It’s time to find out who’s really in command.”  


***

 

The Dendarii were assembled at the top of the mountain when Quinn and his soldiers dragged Vlad out. Vlad found himself mentally counting the ranks. There were tens of thousands of the genetically engineered super-soldiers, perhaps even more elsewhere. Enough to make all the difference that mattered to Sergyar, if only he could stay alive long enough to deceive them.

 _I am Naismith._ He repeated the litany over and over again in his mind. _I am Naismith. Naismith is my life and the lives of my people. Naismith fades for a moment and we all die._

Suegar pushed her way to the front of the ranks. “Stop them!” she commanded. “Stop this mutiny at once! He is the One! He is Admiral Naismith returned!”

Whispers broke out all throughout the crowd. Vlad could see the Dendarii glancing at each other uncertainly. Some looked at him with curiosity, even reverence; but still more moved to stand behind Quinn. Vlad forced himself to stand up straight and look them in the eyes, despite the cold wind biting at his bare skin. _I don’t have a problem. I am the Admiral. I am Naismith. They’re overdressed._

He raised his voice to match Suegar’s. “She tells the truth,” he said, trying to project more confidence than he felt. “I am Admiral Naismith, and I have returned to lead you to battle as was promised. I have returned to take command of my fleet.”

One of Quinn’s soldiers emitted a loud bark of laughter. “You, little human? Command _us_?”

“We have nothing to do with his kind,” said Quinn. He pointed an accusing finger at Vlad, but he turned to face the crowd. “Our ancestors spent centuries constructing us to be the perfect soldiers. Look at him. See how weak and puny he is. Our youngest children could outrun him. We were built for ten times his strength. We can see and hear things that he never will. We have survived this planet for generations, and he will die before you in less than an hour. How can you believe that something like that could ever be the legendary Naismith?"

Vlad restrained a shudder. Quinn was right - if the Dendarii chased him out of the city like the Sergyarans had, he’d die of radiation poisoning before he ever got to his ship. This time he had no choice but to succeed.

Quinn spun, now pointing accusingly at Suegar. "Naismith never existed. _Naismith is a lie!_ "

“There were humans among our ancestors once, Quinn,” said Suegar softly. “Even yours.”

Quinn scoffed at her. “Why should we listen to a word he says, or you? We have hidden from the Cetagandans for centuries. We are alive today while the rest of the galaxy burns around us. Now this impostor turns up and says he would take us back into battle. Why should we leave our safety at his word?”

 _Now_ , thought Vlad. Naismith would not stay silent and let him talk.

“Did your makers also give you courage?" he asked, facing the crowd and spreading his arms. “Listen to me, all of you!” he shouted. “You know who you are! You are the descendants of the Dendarii Free Mercenary Fleet! The greatest fighting force this galaxy has ever known! The _Emperor’s Own_ Dendarii Free Mercenary Fleet! The Empire is in mortal danger, and all you can do is sit here cowering in terror? What happened to your courage? What happened to your honor?”

A dangerous murmur ran through the crowd. “It is not yet time!” hissed Quinn.

“When shall it be time?” Vlad demanded. “You’re no more than a coward, Quinn. _Acting-admiral_ Quinn. Is it so hard to take a demotion?"

Quinn threw up his hands in disgust. “This is idiotic!” he cried. “Even Suegar's legends say that Admiral Naismith was less than five feet tall!”

Vlad shrugged. “It’s been a long time. I grew up.”

He turned back to the soldiers. "I am Admiral Naismith," he said firmly, trying to call up an aura of command. "I have returned as the prophecies foretold. I hereby assume command of the Dendarii Free Mercenary Fleet. And I order you to arrest Commodore Quinn on the charge of mutiny. Now!”

A few hands twitched uneasily in the direction of their weapon belts. No one moved.

"Enough of his lies!" shouted Quinn, his face dark with rage. "Kill the impostor!"

Quinn’s guards surged forward. Vlad backed away and dodged a bolt of energy. It blew the rock beside his head into atoms, searing his face with heat. He turned and ran as fast as his bare feet could carry him.

"That was the stupidest idea ever," he muttered aloud, as he heard the sound of pounding feet and Suegar's shouts behind him. He glanced over his shoulder to see Quinn chasing him with three of his soldiers, and Suegar in close pursuit. She picked up one of the soldiers and threw him into the mountain wall, but Quinn was still ahead of her.

How could he possibly have imagined he could deceive them all? "I must have been insane," he muttered. "And stupid. And now I’m going to die. And.... aargh!"

He flailed madly for a hold, and just managed to scrabble at the edge of the cliff. His last sight before his fingers slipped was that of Quinn's face, contorted with a murderous fanged smile.

Then Suegar hurled herself at Quinn and his two soldiers, and they all fell onto Vlad, and all five of them tumbled off the mountainside.

It was a very, very long way down, thought Vlad.

Quinn was beside him. “So this is where you would lead us, Admiral? Off a cliff?”

Vlad grinned insanely at him. "What, you aren’t perfect soldiers after all? Don't you have genetically engineered wings?"

Suegar blinked on his other side. "You say… we do?"

Vlad looked down at the ground growing larger and larger, and remembered the painting on Beta Colony, and decided that sanity didn't matter anymore. “Yes,” he intoned solemnly. “You do.”

To his shock, Suegar actually raised her arms and flapped them.

Vlad saw the skin on her back part for the long, ribbed, pure white wings to emerge and slowly extend around her. She stopped in mid-air with an expression of stunned delight on her face, and then she was soaring up as her wings caught the wind. Vlad stared up at her as he fell.

"I can fly!" Suegar shouted to the skies in exhilaration. "Look at me! _I can fly!_ "

"Gah..." he uttered weakly.

The ground was centimeters away when Suegar plummeted down and caught Vlad up in her arms. She paused to look back at Quinn and his soldiers as she soared up into the sky.

“Fly, you fools!” she shouted.

"Gah..." said Vlad.

Then Suegar was flying back with him, back up to the edge and over the mountain to the horde that was still standing there unmoving. She put Vlad down very gently on the ground and raised her arms to the sky, displaying her fully extended wings to the Dendarii. “We prepare for battle!” she cried. “Naismith has returned at last!”

Then Quinn and his soldiers were there again, floating beside her. Vlad could see tears in Quinn's eyes as he delivered a perfect salute in mid-air. “Acting-Admiral Quinn reporting, sir!” he said hoarsely. “You have command, sir!”

And then the rest of the Dendarii surged forward, wings erupting from their backs as they hoisted Vlad up on their shoulders, soaring over the mountaintops, chanting his name over and over again.

“Naismith! NAISMITH! _NAISMITH!_ ”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Don't look at me. It was all Philomytha's idea.


End file.
